which were close by. Here I was put into a well-littered stall, and some
warm gruel was brought to me, which I drank thankfully.
In the evening I was sufficiently recovered to be led back to Skinner's
stables, where I think they did the best for me they could. In the
morning Skinner came with a farrier to look at me. He examined me very
closely and said:
This is a case of overwork more than disease, and if you could give him
a run off for six months he would be able to work again; but now there
is not an ounce of strength left in him.
Then he must just go to the dogs, said Skinner. I have no meadows to
nurse sick horses in--he might get well or he might not; that sort of
thing don't suit my business; my plan is to work 'em as long as they'll
go, and then sell 'em for what they'll fetch, at the knacker's or
elsewhere.
If he was broken-winded, said the farrier, you had better have him
killed out of hand, but he is not; there is a sale of horses coming off
in about ten days; if you rest him and feed him up he may pick up, and
you may get more than his skin is worth, at any rate.
Upon this advice Skinner, rather unwillingly, I think, gave orders that
I should be well fed and cared for, and the stable man, happily for me,
carried out the orders with a much better will than his master had in
giving them. Ten days of perfect rest, plenty of good oats, hay,
bran mashes, with boiled linseed mixed in them, did more to get up my
condition than anything else could have done; those linseed mashes were
delicious, and I began to think, after all, it might be better to live
than go to the dogs. When the twelfth day after the accident came, I
was taken to the sale, a few miles out of London. I felt that any change
from my present place must be an improvement, so I held up my head, and
hoped for the best.
48 Farmer Thoroughgood and His Grandson Willie
144