“Wall, I hope you’ll come off better’n he did.  He sunk such a pile that he got discouraged and took to drink; then his wife, a mighty likely woman she is (one o’ the Batchelders of Dull Corner), couldn’t stand it and went back to her old home, and he died ragged and friendless about a month ago.  Ef I’s you, I’d go over, just to take warning and hold up in time.”

CHAPTER III.

Buying A horse.

    “And you know this Deacon Elkins to be a thoroughly reliable man in
    every respect?”

    “Indeed, I do,” said honest Nathan Robbins.  “He is the very soul of
    honor; couldn’t do a mean thing.  I’d trust him with all I have.”

    “Well, I’m glad to hear this, for I’m just going to buy a horse of
    him.”

    “A horse?”

    “Yes—­a horse!”

    “Then I don’t know anything about him!”

    A true tale.

After furnishing my house in the aforesaid economical and nondescript fashion, came the trials of “planting time.”  This was such an unfragrant and expensive period that I pass over it as briefly as possible.  I saw it was necessary in conformity with the appalling situation to alter one vowel in my Manorial Hall.  The haul altogether amounted to eighteen loads besides a hundred bags of vilely smelling fertilizers.  Agents for every kind of phosphates crowded around me, descanting on the needs of the old land, until I began to comprehend what the owner meant by “keeping it up.”  With Gail Hamilton, I had supposed the entire land of this earth to be pretty much the same age until I adopted the “abandoned.”  This I found was fairly senile in its worthless decrepitude.

My expenditure was something prodigious.

Yes, “planting time” was a nightmare in broad daylight, but as I look back, it seems a rosy dream, compared with the prolonged agonies of buying a horse!

All my friends said I must have a horse to truly enjoy the country, and it seemed a simple matter to procure an animal for my own use.

Livery-stable keepers, complaisant and cordial, were continually driving around the corner into my yard, with a tremendous flourish and style, chirking up old by-gones, drawing newly painted buggies, patched-up phaetons, two-seated second-hand “Democrats,” high wagons, low chaises, just for me to try.  They all said that seeing I was a lady and had just come among ’em, they would trade easy and treat me well.  Each mentioned the real value, and a much lower price, at which I, as a special favor, could secure the entire rig.  Their prices were all abominably exorbitant, so I decided to hire for a season.  The dozen beasts tried in two months, if placed in a row, would cure the worst case of melancholia.  Some shied; others were liable to be overcome by “blind staggers”; three had the epizootic badly, and longed to lie down; one was nearly blind.  At last I was told of a lady who desired to leave her pet horse and Sargent buggy in some country home during her three months’ trip abroad.