Black Beauty (1877) is the classic children's book by English author Anna Sewell. A cripple for most of her life, Sewell developed an early love of horses, and the story intended to teach her readers about treating horses (and allegorically all living things) with kindness, patience and sympathy. The story is narrated first-person by Black Beauty, recounting his journey from a farm to the hard life pulling cabs in London to his eventual retirement.