"We may as well give Dobbin his oats here," said Halicarnassus.
We had brought a few in a bag for luncheon, thinking it might help him over the hills. So the wagon was rummaged, the bag brought to light, and I sent to one of the nearest houses to get something for him to eat out of. I did not think to ask what particular vessel to inquire for; but after I had knocked, I decided upon a meat-platter or a pudding-dish, and with the good woman's permission finally took both, that Halicarnassus might have his choice.
"Which is the best?" I asked, holding them up.
He surveyed them carefully, and then said,—
"Now run right back and get a tumbler for him to drink out of, and a teaspoon to feed him with."
I started in good faith, from a mere habit of unquestioning obedience, but with the fourth step my reason returned to me, and I returned to Halicarnassus and—kicked him. That sounds very dreadful and horrible, and it is, if you are thinking of a great, brutal, brogan kick, such as a stupid farmer gives to his patient oxen; but not, if you mean only a delicate, compact, penetrative punch with the toe of a tight-fitting gaiter,—addressed rather to the conscience than the shins, to the sensibilities rather than the senses. The kick masculine is coarse, boorish, unmitigated, predicable only of Calibans. The kick feminine is expressive, suggestive, terse, electric,—an indispensable instrument in domestic discipline, as women will bear me witness, and not at all incompatible with beauty, grace, and amiability. But, right or wrong, after all this interval of rest and reflection, in full view of all the circumstances, my only regret is that I did not tick him harder.
"Now go and fetch your own tools!" I cried, shaking off the yoke of servitude. "I won't be your stable-boy any longer!"
Then, perforce, he gathered up the crockery, marched off in disgrace, and came back with a molasses-hogshead, or a wash-tub, or some such overgrown mastodon, to turn his sixpenny-worth of oats into.
Having fed our mettlesome steed, the next thing was to water him. The Anakim remembered to have seen a pump with a trough somewhere, and they proposed to reconnoitre while we should "wait by the wagon" their return. No, I said we would drive on to the pump, while they walked.
"You drive!" ejaculated Halicarnassus, contemptuously.
Now I do not, as a general thing, have an overweening respect for female teamsters. There is but one woman in the world to whose hands I confide the reins and my bones with entire equanimity; and she says, that, when she is driving, she dreads of all things to meet a driving woman. If a man said this, it might be set down to prejudice. I don't make any account of Halicarnassus's assertion, that, if two women walking in the road on a muddy day meet a carriage, they never keep together, but invariably one runs to the right and one to the left, so that the driver cannot favor them at all, but has to crowd between them, and drive both into the mud. That is palpably interested false witness. He thinks it is fine fun to push women into the mud, and frames such flimsy excuses. But as a woman's thoughts about women, this woman's utterances are deserving of attention; and she says that women are not to be depended upon. She is never sure that they will not turn out on the wrong side. They are nervous; they are timid; they are unreasoning; they are reckless. They will give a horse a disconnected, an utterly inconsequent "cut," making him spring, to the jeopardy of their own and others' safety. They are not concentrative, and they are not infallibly courteous, as men are. I remember I was driving with her once between Newburyport and Boston. It was getting late, and we were very desirous to reach our destination before nightfall. Ahead of us a woman and a girl were jogging along in a country-wagon. As we wished to go much faster than they, we turned aside to pass them; but just as we were well abreast, the woman started up her horse, and he skimmed over the ground like a bird. We laughed, and followed well content. But after he had gone perhaps an eighth of a mile, his speed slackened down to the former jog-trot. Three times we attempted to pass before we really comprehended the fact that that infamous woman was deliberately detaining and annoying us. The third time, when we had so nearly passed them that our horse was turning into the road again, she struck hers up so suddenly and unexpectedly that her wheels almost grazed ours. Of course, understanding her game, we ceased the attempt, having no taste for horse-racing; and nearly all the way from Newburyport to Rowley, she kept up that brigandry, jogging on and forcing us to jog on, neither going ahead herself nor suffering us to do so,—a perfect and most provoking dog in a manger. Her girl-associate would look behind every now and then to take observations, and I mentally hoped that the frisky Bucephalus would frisk his mistress out of the cart and break her ne— arm, or at least put her shoulder out of joint. If he did, I had fully determined in my own mind to hasten to her assistance and shame her to death with delicate and assiduous kindness. But fate lingered like all the rest of us. She reached Rowley in safety, and there our roads separated. Whether she stopped there, or drove into Ethiopian wastes beyond, I cannot say; but I have no doubt that the milk which she carried into Newburyport to market was blue, the butter frowy, and the potatoes exceedingly small.
Now do you mean to tell me that any man would have been guilty of such a thing? I don't mean, would have committed such discourtesy to a woman? Of course not; but would a man ever do it to a man? Never. He might try it once or twice, just for fun, just to show off his horse, but he never would have persisted in it till a joke became an insult, not to say a possible injury.
Still, as I was about to say, when that Rowley jade interrupted me, though I have small faith in Di-Vernonism generally, and no large faith in my own personal prowess, I did feel myself equal to the task of holding the reins while our Rosinante walked along an open road to a pump. I therefore resented Halicarnassus's contemptuous tones, mounted the wagon with as much dignity as wagons allow, sat straight as an arrow on the driver's seat, took the reins in both hands,—as they used to tell me I must not, when I was a little girl, because that was women's way, but I find now that men have adopted it, so I suppose it is all right,—and proceeded to show, like Sam Patch, that some things can be done as well as others. Halicarnassus and the Anakim took up their position in line on the other side of the road, hat in hand, watching.
"Go fast, and shame them," whispered Grande, from the back-seat, and the suggestion jumped with my own mood. It was a moment of intense excitement. To be or not to be. I jerked the lines. Pegasus did not start.
"C-l-k-l-k!" No forward movement.
"Huddup!" Still waiting for reinforcements.
"H-w-e." (Attempt at a whistle. Dead failure.)
(Sotto voce.) "O you beast!" (Pianissimo.) "Gee! Haw! haw! haw!" with a terrible jerking of the reins.
A voice over the way, distinctly audible, utters the cabalistic words, "Two forty." Another voice, as audible, asks, "Which'll you bet on?" It was not soothing. It did seem as if the imp of the perverse had taken possession of that terrible nag to go and make such a display at such a moment. But as his will rose, so did mine, and as my will went up, my whip went with it; but before it came down, Halicarnassus made shift to drone out, "Wouldn't Flora go faster, if she was untied?"
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