62 THE HORSE AND HIS RIDER. 



turned him round to the other side of it; but his 

 whole mind was so intent on the clover, that with the 

 most trifling symptoms only of alarm, he fell to again 

 on the hay, which finished lesson the first. Our 

 next attempt was with a sieve, full of corn (pre- 

 sented to him on an empty stomach), which he could 

 only reach from the tailboard of a tilted wagon an 

 awful object ! After a few snortings and sniffings, 

 here also hunger overcame his fears, and he munched 

 the oats with great relish ; but when the wagon was 

 put in motion, his dread for a little time got the better 

 of his appetite, and the flapping of the covering of the 

 tilt appeared to him most portentous : his fears even 

 in this case, however, soon gave place to confidence, 

 through the skilfulness of a groom to whom he was 

 much attached. This man mounted the wagon, and, 

 resting on the tailboard, offered the oats to the horse, 

 at the same time calling and encouraging him. This 

 worked wonders; nor shall we readily forget the 

 knucker of acknowledgment with which the confiding 

 brute followed the groom's call as the wagon moved 

 on, occasionally dipping his nose into the sieve. 

 After a few more lessons of a similar kind, one or two 

 of which were varied by giving him hay from the 

 window of a stage-coach, he lost all fear of carriages, 

 and his former owner would willingly have taken 



