“A pony reared upon Drumchany, belonging to General Stewart, was once travelling from Edinburgh to Perthshire, in company with several other gentlemen. They were advancing to the neighborhood of Drumchany when it suddenly grew dark, and they could not find the place to take the ford.
“At last, they concluded to trust to the pony’s memory, and, giving him the reins, he trotted on cheerily, till, suddenly pausing and turning to the right, he trotted down a furrow through a potato field, that led directly to the ford in question, which he crossed in the same decided manner, and piloted them safely all the rest of the way to their destination.
“During their stay, he got out of the stable one night, and was found next day pasturing among the mosses where he had been bred.”
“I heard of a case very similar,” rejoined Mr. Gordon, one of the gentlemen who composed the party.
“A gentleman rode a young horse, which he had brought up, thirty miles from home, and to a part of the country where he had never been before. The road was a cross one, and extremely difficult to find; however, by dint of perseverance and inquiry, he at last reached his destination.
“Two years afterward, he had occasion to go the same way, and was benighted four or five miles from the end of his journey. The night was so dark that he could scarcely see the horse’s head. He had a dreary moor and common to pass, and had lost all traces of the proper direction he wished to take. The rain began to fall heavily. He now despaired of reaching the place.
“‘Here am I,’ said he to himself, ‘far from any house, and in the midst of a dreary waste, where I know not which way to direct the course of my steed. I have heard much of the memory of the horse, and that is now my only hope.’
“He threw the reins on the horse’s neck, and encouraging him to proceed, found himself safe at the gate of his friend in less than an hour. What made it more remarkable was the fact, that the animal could not possibly have been over the road, except on the occasion two years before, as no person but his master ever rode him.”
“You said you had another story of a Shetland pony, uncle Frank,” whispered Minnie.
“So I have, dear. It was about a little girl, the daughter of a gentleman in Warwickshire. She was one day playing on the banks of a canal which runs through her father’s grounds, when she had the misfortune to fall in, and would in all probability have been drowned, had not a small pony, which had long been kept in the family, plunged into the stream, and brought the child safely ashore without the slightest injury.”