The Weaver's Horse

Adиle Ashby, a library consultant, is the former editor of Canadian Materials for Schools and Libraries.

Once upon a time in the Middle Ages, there lived a dispossessed
nobleman, Lord Henry, who had lost everything—including Lily, his
beloved coal-black mare. Hoping to earn enough money to find her and buy
her back, he apprenticed himself to a weaver to learn the trade. He
expressed his longing for Lily by weaving tapestries filled with images
of horses; these tapestries were coveted by a local nobleman. When Lord
Henry managed to recover Lily, he changed his motifs to express his
happiness. Angered that Lord Henry was weaving no more horse images, the
nobleman had Lily stolen. Lord Henry, in his despair, started weaving
out his nightmares. So taken was the nobleman by a dragon tapestry that
he returned Lily, and Lord Henry lived out his days as a famous weaver
who rode a coal-black horse.

The text reads well. The accompanying illustrations, each set in a
frame similar to the arched windows of a Romanesque cathedral, add
detail of life in the Middle Ages, although the human figures in them
are all rather static. This book is for older readers.