The Horse, as Comrade and Friend 



you want to make it your instrument, you 

 must exercise yours. 



You have taken the disciple out a number 

 of times, and have shown him many strange 

 things, of which, at their first aspect, he was 

 apprehensive of harm, and have let him see 

 that after all there was nothing in any of these 

 to be afraid of. You have had recalled to you 

 his hereditary instincts and defences. That 

 old blackbird, which tumbled out of the hedge 

 with such a flutter and screech, stirred the 

 same grey matter in his brain which had 

 flashed into action when that desert lion had 

 sprung at, and missed, his ancestor of a miUion 

 generations ago. The disciple made a most 

 splendidiferous shy right across the road, and, 

 if you had not been something of a horseman, 

 you would have been off that trip. It would 

 have taken more than a lion to have got the 

 disciple that time. What is a shy ? It is a 

 perfectly natural and proper defence — not a 

 fault to be punished — and if it had not been 

 practised successfully myriads of times by the 

 disciple's direct ancestors, your particular 

 disciple would not then be between your legs. 



(The Nightmare. — Enter the riding lad on a 

 young and nervous horse. Blackbird, screaming, 

 tumbles out of hedge. Horse shies badly and 



106 



