The Farmer and the Horse
or
How the Farmer’s wife died
Once upon a time there was a farmer. He had a large property and many fine fields. He decided to plant his fields with corn, so he got a strong smart horse to take him into town to buy seeds and pull his plow and haul the harvest into town to sell.
That Spring he and the horse spent many long hard hours planting his fields. Some days they worked from sun up to sun down. Every evening the farmer would put the mare back into the barn and give her a big bucket of grain. This continued for many weeks until the planting was finished. The next day the farmer didn’t come to the barn and the horse watched for him all day.
But the next day the farmer came to the barn and saddled the mare up to go to town to get some medicine for his wife who had a cough. When he returned he put the horse back into the barn and gave her a nice bucket of grain.
It was several days later when the farmer came out again to feed her. “Sorry old gal. My wife has been sick and I didn’t have the time to come out. Here’s some grain.” The horse gobbled up the feed and the farmer return to the house.
A week later the farmer appeared again. The horse was very hungry by this time, but didn’t complain as the farmer saddled her up and rode her into town to get some more medicine for his wife. When they returned, the farmer gave her some grain and disappeared into the house.
The summer was turning to fall, and the crops had grown high. But the farmer didn’t go out to the fields to harvest the corn he’d worked so hard to plant. He was too busy caring for his wife. She kept telling him to hire someone to harvest the corn before it was too late, but he kept saying he would do it, insisting he didn’t have enough money. But before he could get out into the field, the corn turned brown and the deer ravaged the field eating every last kernel.
Meanwhile the horse was getting desperate. She whinnied from the barn to get the farmer’s attention. She was becoming weaker every day without food. She kicked at the door to try to escape.
One day the farmer’s wife took a turn for the worse and he feared she was dying. The farmer rushed down to the barn to get the horse to go to town to get the doctor. When he opened the stall door, the horse lay dead on the floor, starved.