50 THROUGH RUSSIA ON A MUSTANG. 



dealers not only asked me five hundred rubles for 

 horses worth two hundred, but they seemed to think 

 the above method to be an equally fair way of arriving 

 at a horse's age. They showed me a horse which they 

 stated to be five years old, but which was in reality 

 fifteen. I had already obtained a hint as to their 

 methods, and by yielding at the fifteen year end, in- 

 duced them to give way at the five-year end, a year at 

 a time, until they reluctantly admitted that he might 

 be nine years old. 



The roguery of the Russian horse dealers consists 

 largely in brazen mendacity, and in his reluctance to 

 deal with you at all unless he can swindle you. You 

 may know more about the horse you are trying to 

 buy from him than he does, and prove it to him in a 

 dozen ways, but he will haggle and dicker, argue and 

 drink tea with you for a week, rather than let you take 

 him at a reasonable price. As I had no inclination to 

 waste a week on nothing, I looked elsewhere. 



Dr. Carver, the celebrated champion shot, together 

 with a troupe of cowboys and Indians, called " Wild 

 America," happened to be exhibiting in Moscow at 

 the time. I applied to them, and was- thus fortunate 

 enough to obtain a horse that carried me bravely 

 through the trying heat of a Russian summer, in six 

 weeks, to Sevastopol. 



Texas was a Hungarian mustang, which the manager 

 of " Wild America" had bought in Budapest, with a 

 view to breaking him in to the wild work of the arena. 

 Texas, however, turned out to be afraid of the shooting ; 

 afraid of the Indians; afraid of the cowboys; afraid 

 of the band ; afraid of the Deadwood stage ; afraid of 



