To be sure, I had forgotten to unfasten him, and there those two men had stood and known it all the time!  I was in the wagon, so they were secure from personal violence, but I have a vague impression of some “pet names” flying wildly about in the air in that vicinity.  Then we trundled safely down the lane.  We were to go in the direction leading away from home,—­the horse’s.  I don’t think he perceived it at first, but as soon as he did snuff the fact, which happened when he had gone perhaps three rods, he quietly turned around and headed the other way, paying no more attention to my reins or my terrific “whoas” than if I were a sleeping babe.  A horse is none of your woman’s-rights men.  He is Pauline.  He suffers not the woman to usurp authority over him.  He never says anything nor votes anything, but declares himself unequivocally by taking things into his own hands, whenever he knows there is nobody but a woman behind him,—­and somehow he always does know.  After Halicarnassus had turned him back and set him going the right way, I took on a gruff, manny voice, to deceive.  Nonsense!  I could almost see him snap his fingers at me.  He minded my whip no more than he did a fly,—­not so much as he did some flies.  Grande said she supposed his back was all callous.  I acted upon the suggestion, knelt down in the bottom of the wagon, and leaned over the dasher to whip him on his belly, then climbed out on the shafts and snapped about his ears; but he stood it much better than I. Finally I found that by taking the small end of the wooden whip-handle, and sticking it into him, I could elicit a faint flash of light; so I did it with assiduity, but the moderate trot which even that produced was not enough to accomplish my design, which was to outstrip the two men and make them run or beg.  The opposing forces arrived at the pump about the same time.

Halicarnassus took the handle, and gave about five jerks.  Then the Anakim took it and gave five more.  Then they both stopped and wiped their faces.

“What do you suppose this pump was put here for?” asked Halicarnassus.

“A mile-stone, probably,” replied the Anakim.

Then they resumed their Herculean efforts till the water came, and then they got into the wagon, and we drove into the blackberries once more, where we arrived just in season to escape a thunder—­shower, and pile merrily into one of several coaches waiting to convey passengers in various directions as soon as the train should come.

It is very selfish, but fine fun, to have secured your own chosen seat and bestowed your own luggage, and have nothing to do but witness the anxieties and efforts of other people.  This exquisite pleasure we enjoyed for fifteen minutes, edified at the last by hearing one of our coachmen call out, “Here, Rosey, this way!”—­whereupon a manly voice, in the darkness, near us, soliloquized, “Respectful way of addressing a judge of the Supreme Court!” and, being interrogated, the voice informed us that