512 
THE HORRORS OF HORSEMANSHIP. 
caresses, endeavour to take up a position which shall be a golden 
mean between his head and his heels. Whether it be from 
awkwardness on my part, I know not, but I don’t think I ever 
attempted to fondle the ungrateful beasts, that they did not 
exhibit tokens of displeasure. A diminutive starveling of a little 
pony, that I once singled out as the object of my favours, abso¬ 
lutely squealed and kicked at me the moment I put my hand on 
him. The people in the yard called him “Tom Testy and to 
them Tom’s obliquity of temper seemed, like the whims of a 
privileged oddity, only to furnish a source of entertainment. 
These things never amuse me. Sensibly aware, however, of my 
equestrian deficiencies, I have made many attempts to remedy 
them. At one time I took the matter in hand seriously, and 
went so far as to practise every day for a whole week on the back 
of Simon Slug, an old horse of my father’s, which had been in 
the family for a quarter of a century—a quiet, plodding, dozy 
old brute, who moved as if he were made of wood, and seldom 
went out of a jog trot. Yet I never got on Simon’s back without 
some feeling of perturbation ; and, in course of time, Simon per¬ 
ceived it, though, in candour I must own, the only advantage he 
took of his discovery w’as to choose his own gait and his own 
road. The gait he usually selected was his favourite jog, and 
the road, the shortest way home. For the first day or two I 
contended with Simon’s domestic propensities, and by dint of 
coaxing—nay, threatening—I really ventured to have recourse 
to menaces—forced him past his favourite turn; but on the third 
day, w^hether it was that the flies were unreasonable, or that 
home, sweet home,” came more vividly over his recollections, 
I know not; all that I know is, that when I endeavoured to lure 
him on my way, he evinced his total insensibility to my blandish¬ 
ments, by doggedly standing stock-still; and when, adopting 
more vigorous measures, I ventured practically to insinuate that I 
held not the whip in vain, he absolutely shook his ears, and 
backed wdth me. “ O, have it your own way—have it your own 
way,” said I, agitated with fright, and w ithout again attempting 
to use the slightest coercion, but, on the contrary, trying every 
method to mollify and appease him, I became implicitly sub¬ 
servient to his will. Simon having gained his point, seemed 
perfectly satisfied, and jogged home the short way, which brought 
us to the stable yard in a quarter of an hour after we had set 
out. Thus was I tyrannized over for three days running: I then 
gave the matter up as a hopeless case, and left Simon Slug to 
enjoy his otium cum dignitaie ii\.the paddock, without any further 
disturbance. But the most unfortunate passage, perhaps, in my 
life, as connected with this portion of the animal kingdom, took 
