it cured before the race came off with a never-failing remedy he had
discovered--burnt leather and fat.

Every day, along with Dad, we would stand on the fence near the house to
watch Dave gallop Bess from the bottom of the lane to the barn--about a
mile. We could always see him start, but immediately after he would
disappear down a big gully, and we would see nothing more of the gallop
till he came to within a hundred yards of us. And would n't Bess bend to
it once she got up the hill, and fly past with Dave in the stirrups
watching her shadow!--when there was one: she was a little too fine to
throw a shadow always. And when Dave and Bess had got back and Joe had
led her round the yard a few times, Dad would rub the corn-cob over her
again and apply more burnt-leather and fat to her back.

On the morning preceding the race Dad decided to send Bess over three
miles to improve her wind. Dave took her to the crossing at the
creek--supposed to be three miles from Shingle Hut, but it might have been
four or it might have been five, and there was a stony ridge on the way.

We mounted the fence and waited. Tommy Wilkie came along riding a
plough-horse. He waited too.

"Ought to be coming now," Dad observed, and Wilkie got excited. He said
he would go and wait in the gully and race Dave home. "Race him home!"
Dad chuckled, as Tommy cantered off, "he'll never see the way Bess goes."
Then we all laughed.

Just as someone cried "Here he is!" Dave turned the corner into the lane,
and Joe fell off the fence and pulled Dad with him. Dad damned him and
scrambled up again as fast as he could. After a while Tommy Wilkie hove