FOUR HORSES AND A SAILOR


"Huh! Drive four horses! I wouldn't sit behind you--not for a thousand
dollars--over them mountain roads."

So said Henry, and he ought to have known, for he drives four horses
himself.

Said another Glen Ellen friend: "What? London? He drive four horses?
Can't drive one!"

And the best of it is that he was right. Even after managing to get a
few hundred miles with my four horses, I don't know how to drive one.
Just the other day, swinging down a steep mountain road and rounding an
abrupt turn, I came full tilt on a horse and buggy being driven by a
woman up the hill. We could not pass on the narrow road, where was only
a foot to spare, and my horses did not know how to back, especially up-
hill. About two hundred yards down the hill was a spot where we could
pass. The driver of the buggy said she didn't dare back down because she
was not sure of the brake. And as I didn't know how to tackle one horse,
I didn't try it. So we unhitched her horse and backed down by hand.
Which was very well, till it came to hitching the horse to the buggy
again. She didn't know how. I didn't either, and I had depended on her
knowledge. It took us about half an hour, with frequent debates and
consultations, though it is an absolute certainty that never in its life
was that horse hitched in that particular way.