"It's grass, and I sha'n't eat it!" screamed Martin, crying with anger at being so treated, and spewing the green stuff out of his mouth.
Then the man released him, and withdrawing a space of two or three yards, sat down on his haunches, and, planting his bony elbows on his knees thrust his great brown fingers in his tangled hair, and stared at Martin with his big yellow goat's eyes for a long time.
Suddenly a wild excited look came into his eyes, and, leaping up with a shrill cry, which caused all the horses to look round at him, he once more snatched Martin up, and holding him firmly gripped to his ribby side by his arm, bounded off to where a mare was standing giving suck to her young foal. With a vigorous kick he sent the foal away, and forced Martin to take his place, and, to make it easier for him, pressed the teat into his mouth. Martin was not accustomed to feed in that way, and he not only refused to suck, but continued to cry with indignation at such treatment, and to struggle with all his little might to free himself. His striving was all in vain; and by-and-by the man, seeing that he would not suck, had a fresh idea, and, gripping Martin more firmly than ever, with one hand forced and held his mouth open, and with the other drew a stream of milk into it. After choking and spluttering and crying more than ever for a while, Martin began to grow quiet, and to swallow the milk with some satisfaction, for he was very hungry and thirsty, and it tasted very good. By-and-by, when no more milk could be drawn from the teats, he was taken to a second mare, from which the foal was kicked away with as little ceremony as the first one, and then he had as much more milk as he wanted, and began to like being fed in this amusing way.
Of what happened after that Martin did not know much, except that the man seemed very happy after feeding him. He set Martin on the back of a horse, then jumped and danced round him, making funny chuckling noises, after which he rolled horse-like on the grass, his arms and legs up in the air, and finally, pulling Martin down, he made him roll too.
But the little fellow was too tired to keep his eyes any longer open, and when he next opened them it was morning, and he found himself lying wedged in between a mare and her young foal lying side by side close together. There too was the wild man, coiled up like a sleeping dog, his head pillowed on the foal's neck, and the hair of his great shaggy beard thrown like a blanket over Martin.