ipo THE HISTORY AND ART 



the phrafe of hearing the Bell, which implies being 

 comparatively the befl, or moft excellent, and corre- 

 Iponds with the expreffion of bearing the Palm among 

 the ancients, as a reward decreed to the fwiftefl horfe 



« Full many a dainty horfe had he in liable, 

 *' And when he rode men might his Bridle hear 

 " Gyngelyn in a whiftling wind als clere 

 " And eke as loud as doth the chapel bell." 



Cotton, Virgil traveftied. 

 «* Mean time queen Dido was not idle, 

 *' And ^z«^/^ ^/«f/^ went her bridle." 



Rabelais makes Pantagruel take the Bell out of a fteeple, and hang 

 it upon his mare's neck, which moft probably alludes to the cuftom of 

 horfes wearing Bells. The laft, but ftrongeft inftance, becaufe it is 

 very recent, is from Congreve's play of the Old Batchelor ; where com- 

 paring a new married man to a race-horfe going to ftart, he fays, 



«' With gaudy plumes, and gingling Bells made proud, 

 »' The youthful fteed fets out, and neighs aloud." 



After reading the above paflages, and more particularly the laft, 

 few people, it may be prefumed, will doubt of the cuftom that once 

 prevailed of dreffing horfes with bells. At Naples they ufe them occa- 

 fionally for pleafure and parade at this day, and to a kt of coach-horfes 

 will add 2i feventh, hung round and covered with Bellsy which ring 

 and gingle, as the horfe proudly moves on. 



However true the fafts may be, neverthelefs, although I have been 

 neither idle nor inaccurate in my enquiries, I have hitherto been unable 

 to gain any particular information upon the fubjed -, and with refpeft to 

 the lines quoted from Congreve, I have been fo unfuccefsful as never to 

 find any paflage from hiftory, oral tradition, or any account whatever 

 concerning it, although there muft be people ftill living who were con- 

 !temporary with the author, and may well be fuppofed to have fcen and 

 known the faft to which he fp plainly alludes. 



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