THE HORSE AS AN EPIC CHARACTER 



and speed, with ears pricked, heads high, spirited and 

 powerful, with fine nostrils, wide foreheads, mane and 

 tail curled, leaping together. The one gray, handsome, 

 with broad thighs, eager, thundering, trampling. As he 

 goes, his fierce hoofs throw up sods of earth like a flock 

 of swift birds after him. As he gallops on the way, a 

 flash of hot breath darts from him; from his curbed 

 jaws gleams a blast of flame-red fire. The other, dark, 

 small-headed, thin-sided, broad-backed, sure-footed. 

 They come together with fast, joyful steps, moving 

 o'er the plain like a swift mountain mist, or like the 

 rushing of a loud wind in winter." Part of this descrip- 

 tion recalls that of Sigurd's steed in an old Danish 

 song. " Fire flamed from his mouth, and his eye was as 

 bright as the morning star." So one might continue to 

 quote indefinitely; but, as I have said, all heroic horses 

 are not so well-favored. The Spanish Babieca was a 

 mangy colt when the youthful Cid, to his godfather's 

 great disgust, chose him from among other horses in the 

 paddock. Nearly all the Russian steeds are spoken of 

 as shaggy Httle animals. In some of the Ilya songs, 

 Cloudfall, when bought, is desperately ugly. Three 

 months Ilya fed him with finest Turkish wheat and 

 watered him from a pure stream. Then he bound him 

 three nights in the garden and anointed him with three 

 morning dews. This done, he led the foal to the lofty 

 paHng, and the good horse began to leap from side to 

 side and was able to sustain Ilya's vast weight, for he 

 had become a heroic steed. 



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