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The picture horse
A certain Mr. Tsui, of Lin-ching, was too poor to keep his
garden walls in repair, and used often to find a strange horse
lying down on the grass inside. It was a black horse marked with
white, and having a scrubby tail, which looked as if the end had
been burnt off;' and, though always driven away, would still
return to the same spot.
Now Mr. Tsui had a friend, who was holding an appointment
in Shansi; and though he had frequently felt desirous of paying
him a visit, he had no means of traveling so far. Accordingly, he
one day caught the strange horse, and, putting a saddle on its
back, rode away, telling his servants that if the owner of the horse
should appear, he was to inform him where the animal was to be
found.
The horse started off at a very rapid pace, and, in a short time,
they were thirty or forty miles from home; but at night it did not
seem to care for its food, so the next day Mr. Tsui, who thought
perhaps illness might be the cause, held the horse in, and would
not let it gallop so fast. However, the animal did not seem to
approve of this, and kicked and foamed until at length Mr. Tsui
let it go at the same old pace; and by midday he had reached his
destination.
As he rode into the town, the people were astonished to hear of
the marvelous journey just accomplished, and the Governor sent
to say he should like to buy the horse. Mr. Tsui, fearing that the
real owner might come forward, was compelled to refuse this
offer; but when, after six months had elapsed, no inquiries had
been made, he agreed to accept eight hundred ounces of silver,
and handed over the horse to the Governor. He then bought him-
self a good mule, and returned home.
Subsequently, the Governor had occasion to use the horse for
some important business at Lin-ching; and when there it took the
opportunity to run away. The officer in charge pursued it right up to the house of a Mr. Tseng, who lived next door to Mr. Tsui,
and saw it run in and disappear. Thereupon he called upon Mr.
Tseng to restore it to him; and, on the latter declaring he had
never even seen the animal, the officer walked into his private
apartments, where he found, hanging on the wall, a picture of a
horse, by Chen Tzu-ang, exactly like the one he was in search of,
and with part of the tail burnt away by a joss-stick.
It was now clear that the Prince's horse was a supernatural
creature; but the officer, being afraid to go back without it,
would have prosecuted Mr. Tseng, had not Tsui, whose eight
hundred ounces of silver had since increased to something like
ten thousand, stepped in and paid back the original purchase-
money. Mr. Tseng was exceedingly grateful to him for this act of
kindness, ignorant, as he was, of Tsui's previous sale of the
horse.
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