The black piebald was first offered, a very handsome, quiet-looking
animal, apparently quite sound. The cream-nose, I noticed, was a bony,
long-bodied brute, with sleepy eyes and a ewe neck. Could it be that
the little double-dealing witch had intended to deceive me? But in a
moment I dismissed such a suspicion with the scorn it merited. Let a
woman be as false as she can, and able to fool her husband to the top
of her bent, she is, compared with the man who wishes to sell you a
horse, openness and truth itself. I examined the piebald critically,
walking and trotting him round; looked into his mouth, then at hoofs
and fetlocks, beloved of windgalls; gazed with fixed attention into
his eyes and dealt him a sudden brisk blow on the shoulder.
"No weak spot will you find, senor," said Antonio the mendacious, who
was certainly the greatest of the three sinners met together in that
place. "He is my best horse, only four years old, gentle as a lamb,
sound as a bell. Sure-footed, senor, like no other horse; and with
such an easy pace you can ride him at a gallop with a tumbler of water
in your hand and not spill a drop. I will give him away to you for ten
dollars, because you have been generous about the side-saddle, and I
am anxious to serve you well."
"Thank you, my friend," I said. "Your piebald is fifteen years old,
lame in the shoulders, broken in his wind, and has more vices than any
seven horses in the Banda Oriental.
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