FOUNDER OF HIS RACE 83 



CHAPTER XH. 



OLD GREY TELLS PIONEER TALES. 



Many events similar to the one related in the last 

 chapter spread the Morgan's fame throughout the Valley, 

 and when Evans finished his clearing Justin Morgan once 

 more took possession of the horse, for his health was 

 sufficiently restored to take up school-teaching again. 



The change from hard farm-work was very agreeable 

 to True, and they cantered from place to place right 

 gaily, albeit the horse missed the sweet singing of Mas- 

 ter Morgan, who coughed now incessantly, and often 

 had to dismount and rest in the shade of an oak on the 

 roadside. 



He was scarce forty years old, but seemed much more 

 on account of his grievous malady. 



Regularly they went to Royalton, some ten miles to 

 the southward, and True grazed about until school let 

 out. Through the window he sometimes saw the gentle, 

 delicate face of the teacher at his desk, his Continental 

 coat slightly open at the throat, showing a bit of fresh 

 white linen, his queue, in the fashion of the day, tied 

 with a stifif bow of black ribband. 



He was a master of whom any horse might have been 

 proud. 



One day, while waiting for his owner, True wandered 

 into the woods to escape the flies and dust of the high- 

 way, and there he met his friend. Old Grey, who told 

 him how the Indians had burned Royalton in 1780 ; and 



