78 JHE WONDER-BOOK OF HORSES 



as a pathway by which any one could ascend to 

 it. Nobody would have been surprised to see the 

 castle disappear as suddenly as it had come into 

 being; but there it stood day after day, its roof 

 and battlements gleaming in the sunlight, and 

 the blue smoke rising from its tall chimneys. It 

 seemed to have come to stay. 



But what was the use of a noble castle without 

 any noble men or fair women to live in it? If 

 Atlantes had been less wise, this question would 

 have given him some concern; but he had built 

 the palace for inhabitants, and he understood ex- 

 actly how to encourage immigration into his ter- 

 ritories. He might have filled his halls with 

 phantoms bred of his own fanciful dreams and 

 as unsubstantial as the castle itself; but he was 

 too much of a realist for that. He was himself 

 a creature of flesh and blood, of brawn and 

 brains, and he felt that only men and women of 

 the same persuasion were fit to enjoy the delights 

 of his airy palace. To obtain the kind of guests 

 which he preferred, therefore, he had recourse to 

 a cunning stratagem. 



Early every morning, with his great spectacles 

 astride his nose and a big book in his hands, he 

 would mount his winged horse and soar out over 



