Twice-a-week plain dealer. (Cresco, Howard County, Iowa) 1895-1913, 1900-01-02
ROMANCE OF A HORSE.
BETTER LOVED THAN ALL ELSE
BY HIS MASTER.
The Woman Proving False and Killing
ths Horse She Herself Was
Shot by the Man
She Forgot.

ton, Africa, there lies tombstone,
sacred to the memory of Kind Sir and
visible to passengers on the road. 1t
is white and the lettering is carved in
to the stone, while among the racing
stables which have sprung up in the
neighborhood within the past few
years the resting-place of Kind Sir is
a hallowed sanctuary. There is an
element of tragedy in the romance
which is connected with the spot, but
the years have dimmed it, leaving only
as the visible external sign this white
marble, Sacred to the memory Of
Kind Sir" 1t has been so long there
that an inn upon the other side of the
Riccarton road is designated the Cor
nerstone, and from an iron bar, swung
in the northwest wind, which sweeps
the white dust of the road in sheets
before it, suspended painting of the
stone and it's inscription.
The story is the story of mans
love for a woman, dainty Lucy with
fair hair and pale-blue eyes, and an
even greater love for his horse. 1t was
in the early days and a settler had
given his horse to the woman who had
given him her love. The mans affec-
ton for the horse is still local history,
sand the dumb faithfulness of Kind Sir
is told with tear-dimmed eyes by the
grooms and horsemen who go to gaze
upon the stone. There is nothing which
touches the heart of a horseman so
readily as his horse, and the love of
this animal and this man was passion
ate and human. The man owned a
section Of land beyond the province
and used to ride to Riccarton to meet
his betrothed. He was working to
clear the place, preparatory to starting
farm, a small holding upon such as
in the early days welded folks were
proud to start. One day the maoris
swept the settlement and the lover es-
capped upon Kind Sir to the township.
Ruined and homeless his two possess
sions were his horse and his love for
the woman at Riccarton. Buoyed up
by the hope with which woman's
love can inspire man, he started out
again, striking north to the gullies in
the mountains in the search for gold,
While, as an earnest of his love, he
gave his horse, an animal which he
loved as largely as he loved the wOm-
an into her keeping. For a time no
one saw him; them in the passage Of
year or two, he came back, having
crossed the ranges to the west coast
in the search of gold. What he had
found there was ample for his future
needs and his success created the gold
rush to the west coast.
What he met with upon his return
killed everything. The woman had
married, and, the horse proving an in
cumbrance, Kind Sir was shot. OF the
tragedy which followed there are two
versions. The one is that the man,
finding his horse dead, killed himself;
the other that he murdered the woman
and shot himself. Whichever is cor
rect the stone exists in the garden Of
the house upon the Riccarton road. 1t
lies upon mound buried amid the
silt which the winds have swept from
the surface of the road. The township
is now colonial city, but to strangers
who visit it the resting-place Of Kind
Sir is always shown, the connecting
link between an old-time tragedy and
the present which has no other sign
OF life. The action of the woman is
condemned by those who now tell the
| story. The horse served her as faith
fully as he had served his master, and
should have received more gracious
treatment. The woman is shrew in
local fame, the horse saint; and the
grim fierceness which the story
arouses against her memory has pa
thos for those who ride and love their
horses.