What I felt that night I do not care to tell—the sorrow of the time was too deep for words. I loved my mistress; she had come upon me like sunshine after storm—her very touch was balm to my wounded spirit—and she was gone! Roberts made a deal of noise over his sorrow, and I have no doubt he felt the loss; but his wound was not so deep as mine, I warrant you.  
They buried my mistress quietly, as she wished; and then another misfortune came upon me. Mr. Graham was taken ill. Mr. Archibald did not go back to college, but remained with his father; and from this I argued that the illness was of a very serious nature. Then came a dread upon me of what was to come, and I was very unhappy indeed.
 
I saw very little of Mr. Archibald, and what I did see was not pleasing to me. He appeared to be very proud and imperious, and talked to everybody in a very commanding way. As for me, he only came once into the stable, and then he positively laughed at me, called me a ‘broken-down hack,’ and asked Roberts why I was not sent to the knacker’s.
 
76‘Miss Nellie was very fond of Blossom, sir,’ replied Roberts; ‘he ain’t much to look at, but he ain’t a bad horse—he is very willing, sir.’
 
This recommendation made no impression upon Mr. Archibald, who laughed contemptuously and went away; but I felt very grateful to the boy Roberts, who preferred speaking the truth to toadying to the disparaging opinions of his young master. Mr. Graham was very ill, suffering from brain fever, the result of many months of anxiety and watchfulness over his daughter. The illness had long been pending, and descended upon him with terrible force. He became delirious, raving night and day, until nature was exhausted, and a calm settling upon him, he followed his daughter to the grave.
 
This second blow, following so closely upon the first, fairly broke me down; a gloom settled upon the house, but nowhere so darkly as upon me. I not only grieved deeply for the great loss I had sustained, but there was the weight of a dark uncertain future hanging over me.
 
I saw nobody but Roberts until the second funeral was over; and a few days after the event, Mr. Archibald, Roberts, and another servant in livery entered the stable. The latter person seemed to be very deferential to Mr. Archibald, and I saw at once that he was his own servant—a man I had heard Roberts speak of as Mr. Archibald’s Hoskins.
 
‘There, that’s the nag, Hoskins,’ said Mr. Archibald; ‘I make you a present of him, instead of a Christmas box by-and-by. He will fetch something for cats’-meat, if for nothing else.’
 
This unmerited insult was received with an approving laugh from Hoskins; but Roberts, with tears in his eyes, stepped forward and said,—
 
‘If you please, Mr. Archibald, Miss Nellie always said Blossom was not to be sold.’
 
‘Did she?’ returned Mr. Archibald. ‘And pray what was to be done with him?’
 
‘Master said he would keep him while he lived, and leave enough money to keep him at grass in his old days, if he died before him.’
 
Oh, kind mistress and worthy master! you have the thanks 77a horse can give for the noble thought; but alas, it was never to be!
 
‘There was nothing of the sort in his will,’ said Mr. Archibald; ‘and I do not feel called upon to carry out such a sentimental scheme upon your bare assertion, my lad. Hoskins, the animal is yours; get him out of the way as soon as you can, for I want the stable for my own horses.’
 
Having thus sealed my fate, he turned upon his heel and went his way. The cold, selfish sentence of Mr. Archibald Graham was carried out. I will make no comment upon the character of this young man, but leave my readers to judge his conduct for themselves. A few hours later I left him and Maythorn Lodge behind me.
 
Hoskins took me down to Smithfield, where he sold me to the proprietor of an advertising van; and for four months I dragged behind me a huge unsightly structure of light boarding, whereon was pasted the advertisements my master was employed to make known.
 
Sometimes we puffed a patent pill, warranted to cure every form of suffering known to man; at another time we vaunted the merits of some low wretched comic singer, who did his best nightly to degrade already fallen man; and then this gave way to a wholesale outfitter’s declaration that he was the best of tailors; and so we went on, until an Act of Parliament swept advertising vans from the public streets, and my master’s trade was ruined.
 
This was a very wretched time for me: I was badly stabled, badly fed; I was never once decently groomed all the time I was with this man. Sometimes, it is true, he scratched my back with a bit of a curry-comb, and threw a pail or two of water over my legs; but this was all, and what with the life I led, and the wet weather and the dirt of the streets, I sank down very low and became a poor wretched object indeed.
 
I was sold again for so small a sum that I will not name it—none who knew poor Blossom in his earliest days would have dreamt that he could have come to such a pass. This buyer was Mr. Crabbe, livery stable keeper and cab proprietor of Hackney Marsh—the last master I shall ever know.
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