The road was very dreary and dusty, and wound in and out in the most tiresome way until it seemed to have no end to it, and Davy ran on and on, half expecting at any moment to feel the Roc’s great beak pecking at his back. Fortunately his legs carried him along so remarkably well that he felt he could run for a week; and, indeed, he might have done so if he had not, at a sharp turn in the road, come suddenly upon a horse and cab. The horse was fast asleep when Davy dashed against him, but he woke up with a start, and, after whistling like a locomotive once or twice in a very alarming manner, went to sleep again. He was a very frowsy-looking horse, with great lumps at his knees and a long, crooked neck like a camel’s; but what attracted Davy’s attention particularly was the word “Ribsy” painted in whitewash on his side in large letters. He was looking at this, and wondering if it were the horse’s name, when the door of the cab flew open and a man fell out, and, after rolling over in the dust, sat up in the middle of the road and began yawning. He was even a more ridiculous-looking object than the horse, being dressed in a clown’s suit, with a morning-gown over it by way of a top-coat, and a field-marshal’s cocked hat. In fact, if he had not had a whip in his hand no one would ever have taken him for a cabman. After yawning heartily he looked up at Davy, and said drowsily, “Where to?”
“To B.G.,” said Davy, hastily referring to the Hole-keeper’s letter.
“All right,” said the cabman, yawning again. “Climb in, and don’t put your feet on the cushions.”
Now, this was a ridiculous thing for him to say, for when Davy stepped inside he found the only seats were some three-legged stools huddled together in the back part of the cab, all the rest of the space being taken up by a large bath-tub that ran across the front end of it. Davy turned on one of the faucets, but nothing came out except some dust and a few small bits of gravel, and he shut it off again, and, sitting down on one of the little stools, waited patiently for the cab to start.
Just then the cabman put his head in at the window, and, winking at him confidentially, said, “Can you tell me why this horse is like an umbrella?”
“No,” said Davy.
“Because he’s used up,” said the cabman.
“I don’t think that’s a very good conundrum,” said Davy.
“So do I,” said the cabman. “But it’s the best one I can make with this horse. Did you say N.B.?” he asked.
“No, I said B.G.,” said Davy.
“All right,” said the cabman again, and disappeared from the window. Presently there was a loud trampling overhead, and Davy, putting his head out at the window, saw that the cabman had climbed up on top of the cab and was throwing stones at the horse, which was still sleeping peacefully.
The cabman had climbed up on top of the cab and was throwing stones at the horse.
“It’s all right,” said the cabman, cheerfully, as he caught sight of Davy. “If he doesn’t start pretty soon I’ll give him some snuff. That always wakes him up.”
“Oh! don’t do that,” said Davy, anxiously. “I’d rather get out and walk.”
“Well, I wish you would,” said the cabman, in a tone of great relief. “This is a very valuable stand, and I don’t care to lose my place on it;” and Davy accordingly jumped out of the cab and walked away.
Presently there was a clattering of hoofs behind him, and Ribsy came galloping along the road, with nothing on him but his collar. He was holding his big head high in the air, like a giraffe, and gazing proudly about him as he ran. He stopped short when he saw the little boy, and, giving a triumphant whistle, said cheerfully, “How are you again?”
It seemed rather strange to be spoken to by a cab-horse, but Davy answered that he was feeling quite well.
“So am I,” said Ribsy. “The fact is, that when it comes to beating a horse about the head with a three-legged stool, if that horse is going to leave at all, it’s time he was off.”
“I should think it was,” said Davy, earnestly.
“You’ll observe, of course, that I’ve kept on my shoes and my collar,” said Ribsy. “It isn’t genteel to go barefoot, and nothing makes a fellow look so untidy as going about without a collar. The truth is,” he continued, sitting down in the road on his hind legs,—“the truth is, I’m not an ordinary horse, by any means. I have a history, and I’ve arranged it in a popular form, in six canters,—I mean cantos,” he added, hastily correcting himself.
“I’d like to hear it, if you please,” said Davy, politely.
“Well, I’m a little hoarse,”—began Ribsy.
“I think you’re a very big horse,” said Davy, in great surprise.
“I’m referring to my voice,” said Ribsy, haughtily. “Be good enough not to interrupt me again;” and, giving two or three preliminary whistles to clear his throat, he began:—
It’s very confining, this living in stables,
And passing one’s time among wagons and carts;
I much prefer dining at gentlemen’s tables,
And living on turkeys and cranberry tarts.
I find with surprise that I’m constantly sneezing;
I’m stiff in the legs, and I’m often for sale;
And the blue-bottle flies, with their tiresome teasing,
Are quite out of reach of my weary old tail.
“By the way,” said Ribsy, getting up and turning himself around, “what does my tail look like?”
“I think,” said Davy, after a careful inspection, “I think it looks something like an old paint-brush.”
“So I supposed,” said Ribsy, gloomily, and, sitting down again, he went on with his history:—
As spry as a kid and as trim as a spider
Was I in the days of the Turnip-top Hunt,
When I used to get rid of the weight of my rider
And canter contentedly in at the front.
I never was told that this jocular feature
Of mine was a trick reprehensibly rude,
And yet I was sold, like a commonplace creature,
To work in a circus for lodgings and food.
“I suppose you have never been a circus-horse?” said Ribsy, stopping short in his verses again and gazing inquiringly at Davy.
“Never,” said Davy.
“Then you don’t know anything about it,” said Ribsy. “Here we go again:”—
Pray why, if you please, should a capable charger
Perform on a ladder and prance in a show?
And why should his knees be made thicker and larger
By teaching him tricks that he’d rather not know?
Oh! why should a horse, for society fitted,
Be doomed to employment so utterly bad,
And why should a coarse-looking man be permitted
To dance on his back on a top-heavy pad?
Here Ribsy paused once more, and Davy, feeling that he ought to make some sort of an answer to such a lot of questions, said helplessly, “I don’t know.”
“No more do I,” said Ribsy, tossing his head scornfully.
It made me a wreck, with no hope of improvement,
Too feeble to race with an invalid crab;
I’m wry in the neck, with a rickety movement
Peculiarly suited for drawing a cab.
They pinch me with straps, and they bruise me with buckles,
They drive me too rapidly over the stones;—
A reason, perhaps, why a number of knuckles
Have lately appeared on my prominent bones.
“I see them,” cried Davy, eagerly; “I thought they were corns.”
“Thank you,” said Ribsy, haughtily. “As the next verse is the last you needn’t trouble yourself to make any further observations.”
I dream of a spot which I used to roam over
In infancy’s days, with a frolicsome skip,
Content with my lot, which was planted with clover,
And never annoyed by the crack of a whip.
But I think my remarks will determine the question,
Of why I am bony and thin as a rail;
I’m off for some larks, to improve my digestion,
And point the stern moral conveyed by my tail.
Here Ribsy got upon his legs again, and, after a refreshing fillip with his heels, cantered off along the road, whistling as he went. Two large blue-bottle flies were on his back, and his tail was flying around, with an angry whisk, like a pin-wheel; but, as he disappeared in the distance, the flies were still sitting calmly on the ridge of his spine, apparently enjoying the scenery.
Davy was about to start out again on his journey, when he heard a voice shouting “Hi! Hi!” and, looking back, he saw the poor cabman coming along the road on a brisk trot, dragging his cab after him. He had on Ribsy’s harness, and seemed to be in a state of tremendous excitement.
As he came up with Davy the door of the cab flew open again, and the three-legged stools came tumbling out, followed by a dense cloud of dust.
“Get in! Get in!” shouted the cabman, excitedly. “Never mind the dust; I’ve turned it on to make believe we’re going tremendously fast.”
Davy hastily scrambled in, and the cabman started off again. The dust was pouring out of both faucets, and a heavy shower of gravel was rattling into the bath-tub; and, to make matters worse, the cabman was now going along at such an astonishing speed that the cab rocked violently from side to side, like a boat in a stormy sea. Davy made a frantic attempt to shut off the dust, but it seemed to come faster and faster, until he was almost choked, and by this time the gravel had become as large as cherry-stones, and was flying around in the cab and rattling about his ears like a little hail-storm. Now, all this was a great deal more than Davy had bargained for, and it was so very unpleasant that he presently sat down on the floor of the cab in the hope of getting a little out of the way of the flying gravel. As he did this the rocking motion became less violent, and then ceased altogether, as though the cabman had suddenly come to a stop. Then the dust cleared away, and Davy, to his surprise, found himself sitting in the road directly in front of the little house that Jack built.
The cabman and his cab had vanished entirely, but, curiously enough, the cab door was standing wide open in the wall of the house, just above the porch, and in the opening stood the red Cow gazing down upon him, and solemnly chewing, as before. The house had such a familiar look to him that Davy felt quite at home; and, moreover, the Cow seemed quite like an old acquaintance, compared with the other creatures he had met, and he was just about to begin a friendly conversation with her, when she suddenly stopped chewing, and said, “How did you get here?”
“I came in a cab,” said Davy. “We came along just behind the horse.”
“People in cabs usually do,” said the Cow; “leastwise I never heard of any of ’em being ahead of him.”
“But this horse was running away, you know,” said Davy.
“Where was the cabman?” said the Cow, suspiciously.
“He was drawing the cab,” said Davy.
“What!” exclaimed the Cow,—“while the horse was running away? Oh, come, I say!”
“He was, truly,” said Davy, laughing; “you never saw anything half so ridiculous.”
“I certainly never did—that I can remember,” said the Cow; “but then, you see, I haven’t always been a cow.”
“Really?” said Davy.
“Really,” said the Cow, very solemnly. “The fact is, I’ve been changed.”
“And what did you use to be?” said Davy, who was now fully prepared for something marvellous.
“A calf,” said the Cow, with a curious rumbling chuckle.
“I don’t think that’s a very good joke,” said the disappointed little boy.
“It’s a deal funnier than your cab story,” said the Cow. “And, what’s more, it’s true! Good-afternoon.” And with this the Cow disappeared from the opening, and the cab door shut to with a loud bang.
Davy sat still for a moment, hoping that Mother Hubbard, or perhaps the dog, or even the cat, would appear, so that he might explain his story about the cab. None of them came; but meanwhile a very extraordinary thing happened, for the house itself began to go. First the chimneys sank down through the roof, as if they were being lowered into the cellar. Then the roof itself, with its gables and dormer windows, softly folded itself flat down upon the top of the house, out of sight. Then the cab door and the latticed windows fluttered gently for a moment, as if rather uncertain how to dispose of themselves, and finally faded away, one by one, as if they had been soaked into the bricks. Then the porch gravely took itself to pieces and carried itself, so to speak, carefully in through the front door; and finally the front door went in itself, and nothing was left of the house that Jack built but a high brick wall, with the climbing roses running all over it like a beautiful pink vine. All this was so unexpected and so wonderful that Davy sat quite still, expecting something marvellous of this wall; but it proved to be a very matter-of-fact affair, with no intention whatever of doing anything or going anywhere, and, after watching it attentively for a few moments, Davy got up and resumed his journey along the road.