indeed, the ache was even growing worse and worse, and more and more
bitter, now, probably on account of the protracted abstention from food
and drink.

The horse-doctor came, a pleasant man and full of hope and professional
interest in the case. In the matter of smell he was pretty aromatic--in
fact, quite horsy--and I tried to arrange with him for absent treatment,
but it was not in his line, so, out of delicacy, I did not press it. He
looked at my teeth and examined my hock, and said my age and general
condition were favorable to energetic measures; therefore he would give
me something to turn the stomach-ache into the botts and the cold in the
head into the blind staggers; then he should be on his own beat and would
know what to do. He made up a bucket of bran-mash, and said a dipperful
of it every two hours, alternated with a drench with turpentine and
axle-grease in it, would either knock my ailments out of me in twenty-four
hours, or so interest me in other ways as to make me forget they were on
the premises. He administered my first dose himself, then took his
leave, saying I was free to eat and drink anything I pleased and in any
quantity I liked. But I was not hungry any more, and did not care for
food.

I took up the Christian Science book and read half of it, then took a
dipperful of drench and read the other half. The resulting experiences
were full of interest and adventure. All through the rumblings and
grindings and quakings and effervescings accompanying the evolution of
the ache into the botts and the cold into the blind staggers I could note
the generous struggle for mastery going on between the mash and the
drench and the literature; and often I could tell which was ahead, and
could easily distinguish the literature from the others when the others
were separate, though not when they were mixed; for when a bran-mash and