Black Beauty's Family

by Josephine Pullein-Thompson

  No one was ever unkind to me. My food was excellent. My coat shone with health and yet I was unhappy because I lived without one of my kind. Humans do not understand that solitary confinement is torture for many of us. Only these lunch time visits, where often I would be tied close to another horse, saved me from developing a vile and nervous temperament. But however hysterical I felt I was always gentle with Alec, for he was frail, over eighty and also alone. He lived in a little room above my stable next to the loft and he ate in the kitchen with the other servants, and at night I sometimes heard him coughing into the early hours. Although my new master was a medical man he did not seem interested in his groom’s cough and frailty.

  ‘Alec’s tough as an old boot, live to ninety,’ I heard him say on more than one occasion. ‘That’s what washing under a cold pump at six o’clock every morning does for you!’

  But, of course, the doctor would have been horrified had any one seriously suggested that he should follow Alec’s way of life for the good of his own health, for he loved his creature comforts, and in winter was always well wrapped with a great muffler wound round his bull neck.

  Sometimes the doctor was called out in the middle of the night to attend some very ill person. Once we went ten miles in moonlight to visit a child with pneumonia, who had reached the crisis. I spent three hours in a warm loosebox with bars and deep straw which was a pleasant change from a stall. My neighbours were race horses who seemed to speak a language of their own. We came back in the dawn with Master in very good spirits singing in a light baritone voice, because the child had come through the crisis and was sleeping peacefully. Alec, too, had been well cared for by the servants and was reeking of beer, but he was silent as usual.

  Another time, a little mite came banging at the doctor’s front door around eleven o’clock at night. Ragged and dirty with running eyes and sores round his mouth, he made a pitiful picture. But the doctor, when brought down by Albert, his valet, was not sympathetic.

  ‘What is it this time?’ he asked.

  ‘Mamma, Mother, she’s all twisted up with the pain. She’s crying out, sir, crying out!’

  ‘You should have come earlier. It’s a fine time to call a doctor at eleven o’clock at night.’

  ‘We’ve nowt left,’ the little boy said, ‘Nowt at all. We can’t pay yer.’

  ‘Well, tell her I’ll be down presently.’

  ‘I think she’s dying, sir, please come quick,’ the little mite said.

  ‘I’ll be along directly. Now off with you.’

  The poor woman only lived half a mile down the road, but the doctor liked to arrive in style, so Albert wakened Alec and I was harnessed and brought with the trap to the front door. The doctor came out twenty minutes later. What he had been doing in the meantime I do not know. I trotted at a good spanking pace but when we reached the cottage the woman was dead and the little boy weeping in the road.

  ‘They always leave it too late,’ the doctor complained. ‘Yesterday I could have saved her.’ But, as his servants said next morning, standing gossiping in the yard, it was hard to ask for help when you had no money to pay for it.

  ‘He should have gone right away,’ the housekeeper declared. ‘Fancy letting the little mite wait all that time. Now if it had been Lady Louisa at his door that would have been a very different kettle of fish.’ Alec said nothing for a while then he cleared his throat. ‘There’s one rule for gentry and one for the working poor. There always has been and there always will be and them’s not going to stir himself for a penniless woman what’s had more children than she’s any right to.’

  ‘You’re getting as hard as the master,’ the housekeeper said.

  ‘No, I’m just speaking straight as I know ’tis the truth and it’s not only the master who sees it that way.’

  ‘I say it’s a wicked shame,’ said the housekeeper.

  ‘Things are going to change by and by, you mark my words,’ said the jobbing gardener, leaning on his beesom. ‘These trade unions are getting awful strong, and one of these days the gentry are in for a shock.’

  ‘Oh ar! Well, I shall be under the daisies by then I reckons,’ said Alec. ‘And I’m glad I’ve lived when I have, ’cos I’m not sure I believe in all these new fangled ways.’

  There were many such conversations out in the yard or in the kitchen which opened on it, and solitude sharpened my ears so that I could usually hear every word, even when the back door was shut.

  4

  ILLNESS AND PAIN

  I DO NOT think there was any cause for my illness, except perhaps that I was unhappy living alone. It came on quite suddenly as the leaves were falling from the trees and paths of russet and gold led into the murky gloom of the beech-woods. My appetite went, even oats sickened me, but I drank much, for my throat was dry and parched and my tongue thick. My head was like a weight at the end of my neck, so that I could hardly muster the strength to pull the trap along.

  Fortunately master was about to take his annual holiday, leaving his patients in the charge of a young doctor who had taken lodgings in a nearby inn.

  ‘And it looks to me as though Princess needs a rest, too, Alec,’ he said. ‘Either that or she’s turned sour or ill on us.’

  Soon my eyes were gummed-up with yellow discharge each morning and Alec was tempting me with bran and linseed mashes; his rugged old forehead creased with worry, his knotted hands shaking with an old man’s palsy; but I did not mend and two days later Alec consulted his oldest friend, the local farrier, Joshua, who looked me over, peered into my mouth and asked Alec to lead me up the drive and back.

  ‘Them’s feverish,’ said Alec. ‘Them drinks more chilled water than normal.’

  Joshua pushed his greasy cap farther back on his head.

  ‘Bleeding,’ he said. ‘Brings down the fever. It may mean nowt to those with new fangled notions, but I don’t know anything better, relieves the pressure on the brain, rests the heart, cools the system. Bleeding and a purge, Alec.’ He patted my neck, ‘Poor old girl, feel mighty bad, don’t you, just want to lie down and die I reckon.’ He wiped his hands on his leather apron, which smelt of hoof parings, coal and stockholm tar.

  ‘She will be needing a restorative too,’ Alec said. ‘Bleeding pulls them down sometimes. I’ve got a recipe in my cupboard, works like magic. Powdered gentian, Virginian snake root, rust of iron.’

  ‘Yes,’ cut in Joshua. ‘I know that ball, I’ve used it myself. It has saffron too, and mithridate, one ounce of sulphurated oil, oil of aniseed, lesser cardamom seeds and a bit of senna, all beaten together with liquorice powder and syrup of roses. My old father used to swear by that recipe, always claimed it saved many a horse’s life.’

  ‘Restores the appetite,’ said Alec.

  ‘As long as it ain’t the strangles, bleeding is the right answer. But it’s my belief that the trouble’s going to the lungs and there’s not a lot of time to lose,’ said the farrier. ‘I’ve got Carter’s mare waiting to be shod, and then I’ll be around.’

  They took the blood from a vein in my neck by the light of an hurricane lantern. The prick hurt. I was frightened and wanted to break free, but they had twisted a piece of rope round my upper lip – a twitch they called it – which Alec held in one hand on a stick; any movement on my part caused him to tighten this twitch and then the agony was terrible. I saw the red blood running from a tube into a jar, a quart they took; it was quite dark like blackcurrant juice and the smell terrified me – it seemed that my life was running out, but I was powerless. Presently they were satisfied. Joshua stitched the puncture they had made and dabbed the place with tar to seal it. Afterwards I felt too weak with pain and fear and loss of blood to move, but not so thirsty.

  When the moon rose and all was quiet, a silver light shining through the small paned window at the end of my stall, I lay down in the deep straw, stretching out as much as my rope and ball would allow me. I longed for my first home and all the good friends I had left behind, and, most of all, for my
mother with her soft comforting eyes. It was very still; the silence was only broken now and then by the scratching of mice and Alec’s snoring in the little room above my stall. He came down once to see me; his face puffy with sleep, his eyes pale as pebbles, a drip at the end of his red-veined nose. He sat with me as I lay, stroking my neck and talking to me in his old, tired voice, pausing every so often to cough.

  Looking back now over the years, I see that Alec’s life was as hard as a horse’s, perhaps it was worse, for he had no one to nurse him through his illnesses, no hand to stroke his neck or calm his fears. Yet like us he was at the beck and call of a master. He had no freedom, little rest and his room in the loft was, I believe, cold and bare of all save a bed, table and chair.

  In the morning he pushed a purging ball down my throat. It tasted very strong and seemed to burn my gullet, and later I heard him tell the housekeeper that it was made of Barbadoes aloes, ginger, castile soap, sulphur of antimony, kali and oil of aniseed, all made into a whole with syrup of buckthorn. It had an offensive smell, but I was too weak to resist, and, anyway, I would never fight Alec because I loved him and he was my only friend.

  A day after the purging ball my bowels were running, as well as my eyes and nostrils. The pain in my head and chest were like tongs of fire, gripping and easing, gripping and easing; my legs were so weak and swollen that I could barely stand. The days and the night merged. I was hardly aware of light and dark. The two old men looked at me in great misery; there were tears trickling like gentle rain drops down Alec’s hollow cheeks and the frowns in Joshua’s ancient face were deep and long; his mouth dropped: he scratched his thick grey beard in perplexity. ‘More medicine,’ he said.

  They pushed the restorative ball down my throat and then Alec soaked a blanket in hot water and, after wringing it partly dry, put it over my back so that it hung over my sides under the cover of a waterproof sheet. Every two or three minutes this blanket was replaced by another warmer one, the supply of hot water being constantly replenished by one of the doctor’s maids, who brought it across from the house in kettles. After an hour Alec stopped these fomentations and bandaged my legs over the hocks and knees in cotton wool and flannel; then Joshua came and dosed me with Indian Hemp to relieve the pain which was growing in my chest like a furnace gathering strength.

  The two men now tried to persuade me to eat, bringing me sweet smelling mashes, scalded carrots and lucerne, but the sight of food sickened me, and the foul taste of aloes still lingered in my throat.

  The pain grew worse, until I thought I would die; indeed I wanted to die and have done with a life of such misery and loneliness. Then Alec blistered my chest and forearms with mustard, which he said was a counter irritant to lessen the agony, which was a new and different pain to bear.

  The weather changed; the rain beat wildly on my little window and gurgled in the gutters. Outside Alec put a sack over his head to keep his cap dry. Then he fetched the jobbing gardener and begged him to put bars at the end of my stall so that I could be free at last from the rope and ball. The gardener, rolling tobacco in paper, said that I would die.

  ‘’E’s finished. You can see it in ’is eye. I remember seeing the same look in old Ma Bunbury’s donkey the night before it kicked the bucket.’

  ‘Them’s a mare,’ replied Alec scathingly, ‘and the fact that you can’t tell a mare from an ’oss proves your ignorance.’

  The gardener was annoyed now; he banged furiously and sang angrily as he worked, caring little for the extra suffering this noise caused me. But when the bars were fixed across I was glad to be able to stretch out my poor burning body in the straw. The housekeeper, a comely woman with dove-grey eyes, stood anxiously looking at me.

  ‘What will master say? It’ll be the workhouse for you at last, Alec, if that mare dies, you mark my words.’

  Joshua took more blood from me, without a twitch this time, for I was too weak to resist; he stroked my hot head and spoke soothing words into my ear, and I knew then that he was doing every thing he could to save me, and that like Will Aken he cherished horses above all else.

  ‘Not dead yet?’ the gardener asked next morning. ‘Still hanging on? It’s a crying shame that animals should suffer so. Better ask farrier to put her out of her misery.’

  ‘Shut your trap, before I lays into you and knocks your bl . . . block off,’ replied Alec, straightening his back and putting up his fists, like some old bantam cock going into battle for the last time.

  But I didn’t die. All at once the pain lessened; my breath came easier; my aching limbs grew stronger. Night and day separated. There was lightness and there was darkness and a winter sun hanging low in the sky; a skittish breeze sent dry leaves chasing each other down the drive . . . I started to eat with a little pleasure and to listen again for footsteps in the mornings. Old Alec raised his head and began to look people in the face again.

  Soon afterwards Master came home, tanned from a holiday abroad, expecting his horse and servant to be ready at once for work. My appearance shocked him and his anger was terrible to see. The sun’s gold on his face turned to beetroot red, his small plump hands pounded the air. His voice was like thunder in the stillness of the yard that soft November day.

  ‘Have you never heard of a veterinary surgeon, you fool?’ he bawled. ‘This isn’t 1850. This is 1911. Bleeding belongs to the last century. Have you never heard that it was bleeding killed poor Prince Albert? They put the leeches on so often they drained away his strength.’

  Alec said nothing, but stood, as Will Aken had stood, with hanging head, a wizened figure with bandy legs, eyes watery and pale with age. It was hard to believe that the same man had threatened to knock the gardener’s head off only a few days ago.

  The housekeeper stood in her long grey dress, a shawl about her shoulders, a white frilled apron tied round her waist.

  ‘He did his best, sir, and the mare has lived,’ she said. ‘He did what he could by his own lights.’

  ‘And damned fine lights they were, too! Soap and aloes, oil of buckthorn, gipsy remedies, witches brews. Good God, we might be in the dark ages! And now how shall I go on my rounds?’

  Alec raised his head at last. ‘Farrier knows a fine mare at the livery stable, a spirited bay, not young but willing and a treat to watch. Would look grand in your trap by all accounts.’

  ‘I must hire her you mean, while this one rests and renews the blood you have taken? Two horses to keep? It’s going to be deuced expensive. I don’t know why I keep you on, you old fool.’ The Doctor turned on his heel and went back to the house.

  The housekeeper put her hand on Alec’s arm. ‘Come inside and have a nice glass of stout,’ she suggested in a voice soft as a southern wind. ‘Or a little porter. He’ll get over it. Why he looked as though he should lose a little blood himself. I thought he would die of apoplexy. And you up night after night wearing yourself to a shadow! Well that’s the gentry for you, no gratitude. But there now, tomorrow he’ll be his old self again, as sweet as honey, you mark my words.’

  5

  SWEETBRIAR

  THE BAY MARE was all that Joshua had promised, beautiful, sweet tempered and willing; her white starred head fine as china; her carriage proud and cheerful, and her manners without fault.

  Now for the time being my loneliness was at an end, for in the evenings and early mornings Sweetbriar and I enjoyed many a long talk, our breath rising like steam in the keen November air; the fan tail pigeons, who came in for warmth, padding on our backs, coo-ing gently; the smell of hay sweet in our nostrils.

  Like Tomtit, Sweetbriar had lived in London and the impression of that great and squalid city was graven on her heart as indelibly as a brand on a horse’s flank. She pitied especially the bus horses.

  ‘The stopping and starting tries their legs to breaking point. No sooner have they thrown themselves into the traces to get the buses running smoothly than it is time to halt to pick up more passengers and they have to go through the whole business agai
n. After six years of this a horse’s legs are finished and his only thank you is a bullet in the head. They start at five years old and are dead at ten, and no one cares! Oh, it makes me so angry that I want to kick every human I see, but I don’t, my dear, I can’t. It isn’t in my nature.’

  Sweetbriar had been a park hack in London, parading day after day in Rotten Row, a fine lady riding side saddle on her back. ‘Flirting,’ Sweetbriar said, ‘with all the young dandies. A selfish, beautiful little person, who sold me without a second thought when she married a peer and moved to the country.’ Later, pulling a brougham, Sweetbriar had seen much more of London, and on those bright, moonlit November nights she told me about the strange ladies who chained themselves to railings and carried placards asking for votes for women.

  ‘I saw the most singular thing just before I left,’ she said. ‘A whole procession of ladies led by a beautiful grey horse ridden by a Mrs Drummond, sitting astride the saddle like a man. Londoners call this lady “The General”. She commands all those girls who are fighting for votes, whatever those may be. It seems that the men have had votes for years, but do not think the ladies clever enough to have them, too. And the ladies are very angry and will not be denied the right. I wish I was that grey horse, because he looked so beautiful, so loved and admired. I am sure he will be allowed to die of old age as the humans do; he will never finish in a knacker’s yard with a bullet in his head, his blood staining the cobble stones. Everybody was talking about Mrs Drummond at the time, the men most cruelly with sarcasm, but many of the ladies and servant girls with much admiration.’