Chapter 2.
The Author is Taken to a House and His Treatment There.
After traveling about three miles, we came to a long building made of wood.
The roof was low and covered with straw.
I was comforted now and took out some of the toys that travelers usually carry as presents to the natives.
I hoped that these would please the people in the house and they would be encouraged to receive me kindly.
The gray horse made a sign for me to go into a large room with a smooth clay floor and a manger extending the whole length of one side.
There were three nags and two mares, some of them sitting down, which quite amazed me.
The horse followed me in, neighing several times at the others, who all answered back.
We walked through two rooms like this one.
At the door of a third room, the gray horse signaled that I should wait.
I heard him neigh three or four times in the other room.
I waited to hear some answers in a human voice, but I heard none.
The gray horse returned and made a sign for me to follow him into the room.
I saw there only an attractive mare, a colt and a foal, all sitting on their haunches upon mats of straw.
The mare rose from her mat and came close to me.
She looked carefully at my hands and face before finally giving me a disapproving glance.
She turned to the gray horse, and I heard the word, Yahoo, repeated as they talked.
The gray horse called to me again and I followed him first out into kind of a courtyard and then over to another building some distance away.
We entered the building and I saw three of the horrible creatures that I had met when I first landed.
The beasts were feeding upon roots and the flesh of some animal.
They held their food between the claws of their forefeet and tore at it with their teeth.
The creatures were all tied to a beam by strong ropes fastened around their necks.
The gray horse untied, the largest of these animals, and the beast and I were brought close together by the horses who kept repeating the word yahoo.
My horror and shock are not to be described when I saw in this disgusting animal a perfect human face.
The four paws of the yahoo differed from my hands in nothing but the length of the nails and the hairiness on the backs.
I knew very well that our feet looked the same, although the horses did not know this because of my shoes.
In fact, every part of our bodies was the same, except for the hairiness and the color.
The horses could not understand my clothes, which kept them from seeing just how similar the yahoo and I were.
The sorrel nag offered me a root, which I returned to his hoof as civilly as I could.
He brought a piece of flesh from the yahoo's kennel, but it smelled so offensive that I turned from it in disgust.
He then offered me some hay and oats, but I shook my head to show that neither of these were food to me.
I began to fear that I would starve in this country if I did not find some of my own species.
As for these filthy yahoos, the more I came near them, the more hateful they grew.
The gray horse observed my disgust and sent the yahoo back to her kennel.
He then put his forehoof to his mouth, a gesture which surprised me, and made other signs to ask what I would eat.
I was having trouble answering him until I happened to see a cow passing by and pointed at it.
The horse led me back into the house and showed me a good store of milk in earthen and wooden vessels.
He gave me a large bowl of it, which I drank quickly.
I found myself immediately refreshed.
When evening approached, my master ordered a place for me to rest.
It was only six yards from the house and separated from the stable of Vyahu's.
Here I got some straw and, after covering myself with my clothes, slept very soundly.
