Fanny was a little pony, and Louise was a little girl. Fanny had a long black mane and tail, and Louise had long brown curls. Louise wore a gypsy-hat with blue ribbons, and Fanny wore a saddle and bridle with blue girths and reins. Louise was a gentle little girl, and Fanny was a very headstrong pony; consequently Fanny had it all her own way. When she was trotting along the road, with Louise on her back, if she chanced to spy a nice prickly thistle away up on a bank, up she would scramble, as fast as she could go, the sand and gravel rolling down under her hoofs; and, no matter how hard Louise pulled on the reins, there she would stay until she had eaten the thistle down to the very roots. Then she would back down the bank, and trot on. Fanny was fond of other good things besides thistles. She would spy an apple on a tree, no matter how thick the leaves were; and, without waiting to ask Louise's permission, she would run under the tree, stretch her head up among the branches, and even raise herself up on her hind-legs, like a dog, to reach the apple. Louise would clasp Fanny around the neck, and bury her face in her mane: but she often got scratched by the little twigs; and many a long hair has she left waving from the apple-boughs after such an adventure. Whenever Fanny smelled any very savory odor issuing from the kitchen, she would trot up, and put her head in at the window, waiting for Biddy to give her a doughnut or cooky. One day a boy named Frank borrowed Fanny, as he wished to ride out with a little girl from the city. As they were passing a farm-house, Fanny perceived by the smell that some one was frying crullers there. Fanny and Louise She immediately ran down the lane to the house, and stuck her head in at the open window, and would not stir from the spot until the farmer's wife gave her a cruller. Then she went quickly back to the road, and behaved very properly all the rest of the way. Fanny was such a good pony, with all her tricks, that the neighbors often used to borrow her. This Fanny did not think at all fair; and she soon found a way to put a stop to it. One warm summer day, the minister borrowed her in order to visit a sick man about two miles away. After several hours he returned, very warm and tired, walking She had fallen lame when only half-way to the sick man's house; and the good old minister had led her all the way, rather than ride her when she was lame. All the family gathered around Fanny to see where she was hurt, when Fanny tossed her head, kicked up her heels, and pranced off to the stable, no more lame than a young kitten. It had been all a trick to punish the minister for borrowing her. And it succeeded; for he never asked for Fanny again. L. S. H. Divider
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