THE HORSE AND HIS RIDER. 29 



the dog, but showed the utmost dread of his coming 

 near him. The dog soon died, and upon examination 

 it was found that he had been bitten in the tongue by 

 a venomous snake. 



But the horse's sensibility is not a selfish quality ; 

 he often displays the most generous solicitude, to avoid 

 injuring other creatures. It is not an uncommon thing 

 for a fallen soldier to escape without one touch of a 

 hoof, though a charge of cavalry pass over his pros- 

 trate body, every animal in the line leaping clear over 

 him. An old horse belonging to a carter in Strath- 

 negie, Fifeshire, had been particularly familiar with 

 the ways of children, for his master had a large family. 

 One day, as this animal was dragging a loaded cart 

 through a narrow lane near the village, a young child 

 happened to be sprawling in the road, and would in- 

 evitably have been crushed by the wheels, if the saga- 

 cious animal had not prevented it. He carefully took 

 up the child by the clothes with his teeth, carried it for 

 a few yards, and then placed it on a bank by the way- 

 side, moving slowly all the while, and looking back as 

 if to satisfy himself that the wheels of the cart had 

 cleared it. 



Gregarious in the wild state, the horse retains the 

 same sociable disposition in domestication, and shows 

 a great aversion to be left alone. This companionable 

 temper appears very pleasingly in the field, in the gam- 

 boling of horses with each other, in their manifest 



