Now, Old Nig was a black horse, and I'm not sure, but I think his color had something to do with his being named Nig. This horse had won first place in the state one year for his skill in the art of log-skidding. That alone meant that Old Nig was a horse to respect as well as to obey. I had watched a few men work with the horse but had never seen one of them stay with him for long. In fact, Old Nig changed drivers three times one day. He simply wouldn't put up with anyone who cussed him or scolded him. He knew more about the log-skidding business than most of the men he had to put up with. He didn't need anyone to drive him nor try to boss him around. Mostly what Old Nig needed was a man to work for him, to pull his single-tree back when he backed up, so he wouldn't step on it, and he needed a man to hook him onto the next log. He had no hands or he could have done it himself. If you scolded or cussed Old Nig, he would bite you, if and when he got the chance. Or he might stomp his hind foot and switch his tail just to remind you there was fire in that end of him too. One man who worked with the horse was so afraid he might say the wrong thing to him that he put a rein on his bridle and led him around all day without saying anything to him. So, when they put me with Old Nig, I already knew more about the horse than I did about log-skidding. We got along well together. What I didn't know about the job, he did. I just talked to Old Nig as I would talk to you; that is, I would be as kind to you as I was to Old Nig as long as you did your work as well as he did his. I didn't care whether he had a bridle on or not. I didn't need to lead him nor drive him. He knew where to go and what to do. And without a bridle, he could see better how to do his work. I would tell the horse when to back up another few inches and when to get over to the right or to the left. Principally I was his hooker-upper and his unhooker. One day we were sorting a pile of logs, skidding the small ones over by a pile of other small ones, the medium size ones by a pile of medium ones and so on. But there was not a pile of large ones on the yard. So I hooked Old Nig to a large log and told him I'd have to find out where to put it. Then I went to the office and asked the foreman where to put the big logs. In the meantime, the horse took the log to the proper place but I didn't know it. He was already standing there waiting for me to unhook him from it. The foreman came to the door, pointed, and said, "Put it up there where Old Nig took it. He knows where."