Or maybe , thinks I, just maybe, the horse's name is Punch.

Part of a team of huge dray horses, Percherons, perhaps. The other horse being Judy, of course. Actually Judy wasn't a mare BOTH horses were geldings. Their ambitions or at least Punch's ambition , Judy was just along for the ride, so-to-speak, was to join the Circus and pull one of them fancy wagons with the pretty gold leaf decorations.

Well it all came to naught, Punch had a weakness for stout and became terribly drunk on Saint Patrick's Day. When he recovered, he found that Judy had left and taken the harness with "her". For years he could be seen, staggering through the worst part of town, cageing drinks.

He was found frozen to death in an alley in Buffalo. There was only his old, worn horse collar and tucked into it was a faded and stained color graveur, a handbill for Barnum and Bailey's Circus.

Such are the evils of drink!

CB