I have just returned from a day in Epping Forest, whither I was drawn by a rumor of primeval beeches to be seen there. And I found them—groves of the great trees, each as large as the largest oak of my memory. But my interest was soon divided, for our pony was there too—very lovely and very Welsh—tripping along the forest roads and drawing the mind away from a reverie of the old Saxon days, for it was in these very woods that the pious Confessor impartially exercised his two passions for praying and hunting, and here that his devotions were so disturbed by the multitudinous nightingales that he besought God to banish them; and history records that the birds had to go. But I suspect that the arrows of Edward's obedient henchmen assisted a too complaisant deity in the work of banishment. This, too, is the forest through which the mourning Githa brought the body of "Haroldus infelix" to be interred in the abbey founded by him in the woods he had loved. But such faded memories yielded to the modern picture as soon as I saw that my little gallant from the Welsh hills formed a lively part of it. He was there in numbers, attached to carts full of children, to ladies' traps, and sometimes to a more ambitious vehicle. I saw one noble fellow, barely eleven hands high, drawing two fat men, each weighing, to my indignant eyes, at least seventeen stone. In my first rashness I should have protested, but the men were lolling back in such a haze of bliss, pipes in their mouths, and beaming with contentment, that I felt it would be irreverent to disturb a happiness so rare in this rough world. I also saw that the little Welsher was in good fettle and would probably be the first to resent a protest involving an impeachment of his powers.
LONGMYND CASTOR
Imported Welsh Pony
The carts that pleased me most were those that overflowed with chirruppy, glowing children. They usually took the by-ways denied to the motors, and as they bubbled out of sight into a leafy world, I felt renewedly grateful to the gentle servitor that makes such intimacy between childhood and woodland possible. Little feet cannot get far unassisted, but give them such a helper as the pony and their explorations need hardly be limited. The ideal creature for this purpose is the mountain pony of about eleven hands. Sagacious and docile, he is the safest of companions, and is just as happy under saddle as in harness. The Welsh-Pony- and Cob-Society recognizes two classes of the pony, one this smaller animal of the mountains, not exceeding twelve hands in height, and the larger pony, usually lowland bred, which may be as high as thirteen hands. But the mountain pony is held to be the foundation stock of all the ponies of Wales; furnishing the indestructible material from which is bred the little hunter, saddler and harness pony, or the dear, obliging factotum who will equably plough your garden in the morning and high-step in the park in the afternoon. Whatever his family leanings, toward the Arab, thoroughbred, or more cobby-built type, you will find his "pony character" unaffected. I have already alluded to this attribute, so evident in the pony and so elusive in definition. It is a quality made up of so many others that a full description would be mere endless analysis. Even the all-charitable word, "temperament," will not shelter inadequacy here. To know it one must know the pony. A hint of it is found in his warm, quick sympathy. The horse, however faithful, can at times be cold and judicial in friendship. The pony accepts you without reserving his judgment. He must love wholly, by virtue of the romance that is in him—a tinge of imagination that enables him to idealize rather than criticise, and not an inferior mentality as some students of horse psychology would mistakenly have it. But, though the latchstring of welcome is always out, he will never toss it in your face, for he, too, has a dignity that awaits approach. He serves you, but he is not your underling. If you are so cruel as to be simply the master, ignoring the higher calls of companionship, he does not retreat into indifference, as the horse will, but remains hopeful, expectant, until he wins an understanding or breaks his heart. I do not exaggerate. Wait till you know him; and then you will not more than feebly doubt the story of the pony who came to his aged master, Saint Columba, on the day he was to die, and foremourned their parting.
LONGMYND ECLIPSE AND MY LORD PEMBROKE
"Character" is also found in the way the pony uses his eye—the manner of his outlook on the world. In the horse's eye one may sometimes read a slight suggestion of boredom. He is disillusioned. But the pony does not confess to a finished experience; there may be surprises ahead. He is blithely ready for the unusual; and this brings us to another element of "character" which is peculiarly the pony's; that is, a shrewd understanding which gets him out of a difficulty while the horse is still pondering. The latter has had his nose in the mangers of civilization so long that he has lost the mental independence which his pre-domestic life fostered. Unstimulating, derivative knowledge he has in plenty from his association with man; but the Welsh pony of the hilltops, to this day pressed by the necessity of looking out for himself, has a capable initiative which the horse does not possess. Through ages on his sequestered peaks he fought for life against an enemy armed with sleet and snows and dearth, and the record of his struggle is writ in his fibre. He knows where he may climb and where he may not, the slopes that will let him live and the steeps where starvation waits. The colt, though he has never been in a bog, will avoid its treachery, and needs no warning where the gully is ugly, the pool deep, or the ice too thin to bear him. And there has been much hiding and flying, for the sheep-dogs of Wales have been merciless to the pony. Some call here, you see, for a usable mind!