Page:Black Beauty (1877).djvu/137

Rh good deal of road-mending going on, and even where the stones were not freshly laid down, there were a great many loose ones about. My driver was laughing and joking with the lady and the children, and talking about the country to the right and the left; but he never thought it worth while to keep an eye on his horse, or to drive on the smoothest parts of the road; and so it easily happened, that I got a stone in one of my fore feet.

Now if Mr. Gordon, or John, or in fact, any good driver had been there, he would have seen that something was wrong, before I had gone three paces. Or even if it had been dark, a practised hand would have felt by the rein that there was something wrong in the step, and they would have got down and picked out the stone. But this man went on laughing and talking, whilst at every step the stone became more firmly wedged between my shoe and the frog of my foot. The stone was sharp on the inside and round on the outside, which as every one knows, is the most dangerous kind that a horse can pick up; at the same time cutting his foot, and making him most liable to stumble and fall.

Whether the man was partly blind, or only very careless, I can't say; but he drove me with that stone in my foot for a good half mile before he saw anything. By that time I was going so lame with the pain, that at last he saw it and called out, "Well, here's a go! Why they have sent us out with a lame horse! What a shame!"

He then chucked the reins and flipped about with