MR. HAY.

I have the most severe misgiving about a crucial point of this story; it involves an announcement which may cause the modern reader to throw aside the narrative as a preposterous absurdity. Ah! if I only had to deal with the reader of the Dark Ages, who would swallow anything! Absolute fear incites me to keep this announcement to myself until nearing the end of the tale, and then to break the awkward fact very gently—glossing it over as much as possible; but native outspokenness, assisted by the fact that such a course would spoil the story, persuades me to make the risky announcement at once, and chance the consequences.

Very well, then—Andrew P. Hay was a Centaur—aCentaur. He had descended from the pure blood of the old Greek Centaurs. The race, when the belief in the Greek mythology had waned before the spreading light of Christianity, finding the fact of its existence no longer accepted with the old unquestioning faith, and too proud to longer impose its presence on a society sceptical of its reality, retired to a remote island to carry on its existence unseen by mankind; and there its successive generations had appeared and died, until—a few years before the present date—the last survivor paced, with downcast hoof,[2]the deserted paddocks of his sires.[3]

[2]"Downcast hoof," though an unusual, is a good phrase.

[3]"Sires" is a well-chosen word in this connection.

The loneliness of his condition began to prey upon his mind. He had but a single companion in the secluded upland valleys of that deserted island where his forefathers had lived during so many centuries; this companion was his servant, or valet—he also being the sole survivor ofhisrace, the race of hippopaides, or stable boys; from time immemorial the bondmen of the Centaurs and their faithful attendants.

The loneliness was becoming unbearable: concealed behind some crag of the mountains, the two would stand the whole day long watching for the smoke of the steamers whichpassed, hull down, to and from Constantinople and Smyrna. No vessel ever touched at their island.

"Raiboskeles," said Philippos Chortophagos (that was the Centaur's name, excusable in a Greek), "this won't do! I can't stand it any longer. Shall we hurl ourselves from yonder pinnacle, you seated on my back, to fathomless doom, and end it?"

"No, my lord!" said the boy, "I'm scratched for that event anyway; and what's more,youwon't go to the post either ifIcan stop it! Think, my lord—what would your stable-companions, now passed away, have said about a fixture like that?" And the boy's eyes filled with tears as he mechanically took from his pocket a small curry-comb and drew it caressingly over the silky hide, while a low continuous hissing sound from between his lips testified to the depth of his sorrow.

He was a good lad, tinged with the archaic stable-slang of Thessaly, fostered by constant reading of theRhodochroon Hen, the ancient sporting-paper of the Centaurs.

For a few moments Chortophagos gazed fixedly out to sea; then he said:—

"Raiboskeles, I cannot stay here. I shall go mad in this solitude. Let us leave this island and go among men. I know what you are about to say—they will not believe in my existence. I shall be forced to suffer the affront of being looked upon as a figment of superstition, of having my impossibility cast in my teeth—I wager that is what is on your tongue?"

"No takers!" said the boy, emphatically.

"Nevertheless, I prefer even that to the loneliness of this place. Besides, I might perhaps manage to conceal the difference in my form from those of men."

The stable-valet shook his head doubtfully. "Too much handicapped!" he murmured.

"I might adopt a false name!" cried the Centaur, with a sudden inspiration.

The idea took the stable-valet unawares. "Ah! there's something in that tip!" he said, half persuaded.

"I will—I'll find one at once: and that'll break the neck of the whole difficulty! I have it—I'll call myself Hay—Andrew P. Hay. See?—Hay retains enough of my ancestral name; the Philip I'll retain as a reminder of my duty toward my race; while the Andrew will assert the manhood of part of me—eh?"

"Ye—es," said Raiboskeles, reflecting, "I think I'll befriend that dodge at commanding prices." ThisRhodochroon Henphraseology was oppressive at times; but his heart was in the right place.

"Let us hail a steamer somehow," cried the Centaur (whom we will henceforth call Andrew P. Hay).

The valet stood for a moment plunged in thought, smacking his bare leg with an olive-twig; then he said:—

"You'll have to travel as a gee. Half a sec!"

"HE SLIPPED IT OVER THE HEAD OF HIS MASTER."

With incredible dexterity he plaited reeds from an adjacent stream into the form of a horse's head-and-neck cover; then respectfully slipped it over the human head and torso of his master. The part where the horse's nose should have been he had packed with grass: the head of Andrew P. Hay filled up the crown; while his human body made a fair show, beneath the covering, of being ahorse's neck. The breadth where the man's shoulders came the valet subsequently explained by stating that he had placed a collar of osiers there to keep off the rub of the covering. There seemed an indignity about it which Mr. Hay found it hard to bear; but he got over it.

Then the valet made a great fire of dry wood and grasses on a pinnacle; and the great column of smoke attracted the attention of a passing coaster, which bore down on the island to find out the reason of it. Bowes (that being the new name which Mr. Hay had found for his stable-valet) stood on the shore holding his charge with a halter of twisted grasses. The captain was surprised, but agreed to take them aboard, provided the horse could swim to the vessel, which could not get in: so Mr. Hay, with Bowes on his back, promptly took to the water, and was hoisted aboard in a sling from the davits.

"That's a very remarkable animal!" said the Greek captain to Bowes. His dialect was atrocious. Bowes could not understand a word; but signs did just as well.

Mr. Andrew P. Hay had decided to go to London. He knew a fair amount of English; for several years before a box from a wrecked vessel had been cast ashore on the island, and it had happened to contain some useful books and papers—a text of Homer, interlined with Mr. Gladstone's translation into English, several Greek-English primers, a Liddell and Scott's lexicon, some Ollendorffs, a Lindley Murray, Webster's American Dictionary, several issues of theTimes, and a rhyming dictionary. Thus had A. P. Hay been enabled to learn the English language.

The journey to England was full of unpleasantness. There were difficulties, too, about meals; the Centaur having conceived a growing distaste for hay and beans. The coaster had landed them at Otranto, where Bowes promptly engaged a private stable for his master. But now occurred the first difficulty—they had no money. The captain of the coaster had yet to be paid.

But Bowes contrived to obtain, on credit, a suit of clothes in place of his tunic of woven grasses.

"There's only one way out of this, sir," said Bowes, after a spell of thought; "I shall have to sell you!"

"I fail to catch your meaning," said Mr. Hay, loftily pawing the ground. "Sellme?"

"That's it, sir; that's the only planIcan back for a place. You ought to fetch a good round sum, sir. Why, sir, look at you—there you stand, 17.1, deep in the girth, lovely clean houghs and pasterns, sir—look at 'em yourself if you ain't satisfied—sound wind, well planted, born flier, grand action. Look at your pedigree, that's enough! No vice—lady could hunt you, sir—oh, I'm not saying it to flatter you, sir! As for selling you—don't you see," said Bowes, placing his finger to his nose, "that's just a bit of practice, that's all. We shall have to sharp 'em. Let me alone to see to that."

"Well, Bowes," said the master, "I have every confidence in you, although I do not quite grasp your plan. I must only request that you will do no act calculated to lessen our self-respect or——"

"Get us warned off the course?" said Bowes. "Oh, that'll be all square."

"But you forget that no one will buy me without seeing my head! If I show that, all is lost!"

Bowes merely winked, and went out. Otranto was a most unpromising place for selling a fine horse; but Bowes made inquiries, and discovered that a rich Englishman, much given to horses—a gentleman-jockey—whose yacht was cruising in those parts, happened to be in the town. So Bowes fetched out Mr. Hay, mounted him, and caracoled him all over the place where a horse could manage to go; and presently he caught the eye of the gentleman-jockey. The latter had never seen such a picture of a horse in his life, and yearned to own Mr. Hay.

Bowes explained that he wasn't for sale; that, in fact, he was half sold already to an American millionaire. (Bowes had picked up a considerable smattering of English from his master, you see.)

"Look here," said the gentleman-jockey, "I must have him. On his back I could win every steeplechase in the kingdom. I'll give you £1,000 for him."

"Down?" said Bowes.

"Yes," replied the other. "I'll put off to my yacht and fetch it."

In an hour the £1,000 in gold and Italian paper was in Bowes's possession. Bowes had explained how it would be unwise to unwrap Mr. Hay's head and neck then, as a cold wind was blowing, and the horse had caught a slight cold on his voyage. The jockey was so overcome by the magnificence of the visible parts of Mr. Hay, and so convinced of the wonderful bargain he had made, that he was content to take the head and neck for granted rather than let him go to the American millionaire; so Mr. Hay was put back in the stable for the night, and one of the yacht's crew left there to see to his safety.

Shortly after dark Bowes picked the lockand crept in. Silently he placed a newly-acquired saddle on Mr. Hay's back.

"I'LL GIVE YOU £1,000 FOR HIM."

"What now?" whispered Andrew P. Hay.

"We must be off at once and cover as many miles as we can before daylight," whispered Bowes.

"But," objected Mr. Hay, "this is immoral!"

All the refined morality of the ancient Centaurs welled up in him.

"Pooh!" whispered Bowes. "Meaning no offence, sir; but it's got to be done!"

At this moment the sailor woke and rose to see what was going on. Now, gentleman and man of honour as Mr. Hay was down to the waist, the instinct of battle and self-preservation in his equine portion instantly gained the ascendency in those moments when action was called for; and it was with feelings of the most unfeigned horror and regret that he felt himself backing toward the unhappy sailor and taking up a favourable position for an effective kick.

"Bowes!" he said, in an agony of apprehension. "Quick! Don't you see what I'm doing? For Heaven's sake give me a cut over the quarters! Here—pull my head up, so that I can't lash out!"

But it was too late; the equine nature situated in the hind-quarters had prevailed: there was an end of the sailor: Andrew P. Hay hid his face in his hands with a bitter sob, and suffered himself to be led out and mounted in silence.

"You won't mind my presumption in wearing spurs, sir?" he said, apologetically. "We might want 'em when you get tired."

Andrew P. Hay hardly heard the remark; his thoughts were absorbed by the regrettable incident of the sailor; at a touch of the spur he broke mechanically into a gallop, which he continued unbrokenly far into the night. Suddenly he pulled up.

"Bowes," he said, "I'm famishing ——. Imusthave a meal; I've eaten nothing since the day before yesterday!"

"All right, sir," replied Bowes, as he prepared to strap on a nose-bag filled with chaff and locust beans; "you shall have a bran-mash as soon as ever we reach——"

"Take away this stuff!" said Mr. Hay, impatiently. "Do you hear? I've taken a dislike to hay and beans and bran-mashes; they're undignified food for a gentleman to eat, and I've done with them. I want a biftek aux pommes frites!"

"Can't get it here, sir," said Bowes, touching his cap. "Oh; why, I've got some sandwiches and a bottle of Marsala in the bag. But, if I may make so bold, the beans would have more stay in 'em——"

"For the equine portion, no doubt. Confound my equine portion, Bowes! It's in disgrace; I'm disgusted with it, and I'll starve it!"

"Let's wait till we get home, sir, for that—if I might make bold to advise. It's just the hossey parts you require on the road."

"Hum! there's something in that," said Mr. Hay; "well, give me the disgusting nose-bag; and when I've finished the confounded beans I will have a sandwich and a glass of Marsala to remove the taste.... This Marsala is a coarse wine, Bowes; was this the best thing you could get?"

They set off again at a gallop; and Mr. Hay soon perceived the wisdom of having temporarily refreshed his horse-part. But his aversion of, and anger against, it grew steadily. As he galloped he continued to brood upon the unjustifiable deed it had so lately committed; and he speculated with an oppressing anxiety on the acts it might commit in the future; realizing, as he did, that he had no control over that portion of him.

In spite of mountains, and the necessity for occasional rest, they reached Naples in two days. Here Bowes, having changed to a new and horsey suit of clothes, and provided Mr. Hay with new and handsome horse-clothing (so that they were unrecognisable), engaged a horse-box to Calais.

No mere horse could have covered the distance in the time; so they had eluded pursuit.

They reached London at last, and Bowes took a secluded villa, with stable, in St. John's Wood. The stable was merely a necessary artifice. With a sigh of relief Andrew P. Hay threw himself down on the hearthrug in the drawing-room; but the bitterness of association with that hateful horse-part was always with him. His dislike of it had grown to a positive loathing. His conduct when that part of him was in question was really most unreasonable. He would snatch up Bowes's riding-whip—the poker—anything, and belabour that horse-portion until it lashed out at the tables and chairs and smashed them to atoms. These scenes were most painful to Bowes.

"LASHED OUT AT THE TABLES AND CHAIRS."

Andrew P. Hay was possessed of remarkable aptitude, and, as the £1,000 so fraudulently acquired by Bowes was fast running out, it became necessary to cast about for employment. Now, his knowledge of the archaic Greek tongue, history, and antiquities, gained from direct tradition, was considerable; and he wrote to the authorities of the British Museum, the Society of Antiquaries, the Kernoozers' Club, and various other learned bodies, offering himself as correspondent and referee at a reasonable salary.

After some correspondence his services were eagerly accepted; and for a time all worked well. Dr. Schliemann considered him invaluable, and much light was thrown upon the question of early Greek inscriptions, and the true site of Troy, and of the Garden of the Hesperides; while much interesting tittle-tattle, from authentic sources, added to the knowledge of the private character and daily life of Ajax, Achilles, the Muses, Hercules, and others. All this had been communicated by letter; but one calamitous day a learned official from the British Museum called, and, before it could be prevented, had penetrated to the presence of Mr. Hay.

The meeting was most painful. Mr. Hay, attired in a loose morning coat and white waistcoat, was writing a paper on the differences between the Sapphic and Pindaric harps; while his equine part was fraying out the carpet with its hoofs and flicking away flies with its tail. Mr. Hay made a desperate effort to conceal the equine portion with thetails of his coat, but in vain. The official was deeply shocked and pained.

"A—a—ahem! A Centaur, I believe?" he gasped.

Prevarication was useless. Andrew P. Hay bowed stiffly, and motioned the visitor to a chair.

"I—I must confess that I—er—hardly anticipated this—er ——. I was under the impression that we had been dealing with an ordinary human being if you'll excuse my saying so: but, forgive me—I fear the authorities to whom I am answerable will hardly approve of my obtaining information from a—er—a fabulous monster."

"Awhat, sir?" cried A. P. Hay: and he felt that equine part beginning to edge round for a kick, while his ears were lying back close to his head—the only equine idiosyncrasy of his human part; but one which distressed him greatly. He shouted for Bowes to catch hold of his head; he seized the poker and hammered at his flanks; but all in vain—those terrible hind-legs lashed out: and the official of the British Museum was no more.

It was a terrible affair: everything came out. Poor Mr. Hay was arrested and taken to Bow Street, where he was locked up in the green-yard stables.

The horse-part resisted violently, nearly killing three policemen, and attempting to gallop off; while Mr. Hay begged them to throw him and sit on his head, and subsequently apologized most sincerely.

The gaoler was very considerate, giving him his choice of oats or the usual fare.

The magistrate was greatly surprised; but, of course, sent the case for trial. At the trial, although the facts were clearly proved, the jury were divided, some bringing in a verdict of deliberate murder against Andrew Philip Hay; some considering him not guilty, but recommending the destruction of the horse-portion as a dangerous animal. The judge, animadverting in the severest terms on the conduct of the prisoner, declared that, although the jury had not been able to agree as to a verdict, society could not exonerate the perpetrator of such a deed; and exhorted the prisoner to reflect deeply upon his conduct, and make such atonement as remorse and contrition would suggest.

He then proceeded to comment upon the injudiciousness of the prisoner, who (although apparently guiltless of any desire to sacrifice human life) was, nevertheless, greatly to blame for his recklessness in keeping so dangerous an animal.

His Lordship asked whether prisoner would consent to have the animal destroyed. Prisoner was understood to reply that that was impossible for physical reasons which none could regret more deeply than himself.

Great excitement was created at this point by prisoner kicking out the back and sides of the dock, and hurling the usher into the gallery; prisoner, however, having apologized and expressed his belief that the incident had been occasioned by a horsefly, the matter was allowed to drop.

"KICKING THE USHER INTO THE GALLERY."

The judge, having retired for an hour to consider his action in the matter, stated that he considered it his duty, while severely deploring the murderous proclivities of the prisoner and regretting that the disagreement of the jury prevented him passing the capital sentence, to exonerate the accused from any intention to permit the animal to do grievous bodily harm, and recommended the keeping of it under proper surveillance.

Prisoner having undertaken to lash his equine-part within an inch of its life, his lordship remarked that he could not sanction any proceedings involving cruelty to the lower animals. Prisoner was then discharged.

Andrew P. Hay was plunged in profound misery. The disgrace and exposure of the whole proceedings, the degradation of his self-respect, cast over him a hopeless gloom. For hours he sat on his haunches, his face hidden in his hands, while scalding tears trickled between his fingers: then he suddenly arose, and kicked the villa to fragments.

At length his calmness returned, and he sat down to think the thing out. The exposure had come—why should he not turn it to good account?

"Bowes!" he called. Poor Bowes dragged his bruised remains from among the ruined brickwork.

"Bowes, my pride has gone. I intend to make a fortune by lecturing all over the country about Greek antiquities, and my recent trial. Pack my portmanteau, and then go round and engage halls."

The lectures created afurore. The public did not care two straws about Greek antiquities; but they crushed to hear a real live Centaur lecture about a murder case. At the end of a year he had amassed wealth B.D.A.

Andrew Philip, Lord Hippstable, Baron Hay, is now one of the best known and most highly respected—er—men in society. He was lately presented with a massive service of plate by the Meltonshire Hunt, in acknowledgment of his valued services as master of the hounds; he is the most famous steeplechase—ah—rider of the day; and the last five Derby winners have hailed from his stable—in fact, he entered for one Derby himself, but was disqualified on purely technical grounds; and there is some talk in well-informed circles of his probable succession to the posts of President of the Jockey Club and Equerry to the Prince of Wales.

J. F. Sullivan.

Off to the StationHulloa!Who's this running?To theTrainsConfound you Sir 10 minutes to wait!J.A.S

Hulloa!Who's this running?

To theTrains

Confound you Sir 10 minutes to wait!

J.A.S

Transcriber's Notes:Simple spelling, grammar, and typographical errors were silently corrected.Anachronistic and non-standard spellings retained as printed.Title page and table of contents added by transcriber.

Simple spelling, grammar, and typographical errors were silently corrected.

Anachronistic and non-standard spellings retained as printed.

Title page and table of contents added by transcriber.

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