Page:Aunt Jo's Scrap-Bag, Volume 4.djvu/96

 him at our bars, looking over at us playing in the field. I wanted him to come in, but Mr. White came along and drove him off, and said he was to be killed because he had no master, and was a nuisance. Don't let him do it!"

"But, Neddy, I cannot take him in, as I did the lame chicken, and the cat without a tail. He is too big, and eats too much, and we have no barn. Mr. White can find his master, perhaps, or use him for light work."

Mamma got no further, for Ned said again,—

"No, he can't. He says the poor old thing is of no use but to boil up. And his master won't be found, because he has gone away, and left Major to take care of himself. Mr. White knew the man, and says he had Major more than eighteen years, and he was a good horse, and now he's left to die all alone. Wouldn't I like to pound that man?"

"It was cruel, Neddy, and we must see what we can do."

So mamma put down her work and followed her boy, who raced before her to tell Posy it would be "all right" now.

Mrs. West found her small daughter perched on a stone wall, patting the head of an old white horse,