HORSE THAT STOOD STILL.

Rangitikei Advocate and Manawatu Argus, Volume XXII, Issue 9000, 13 November 1907, Page 4

HORSE THAT STOOD STILL.

The typical American mule had a rival in the case of a horse at .Charing Cross, which for pure “ cussed - uess” and staying power could have given points to its Transatlantic relative (says a Daily Mail of a a recent date). At the busiest time of the day the horse, which was harnessed to a van, decided apparently that the weather was too warm for any further exertion. At all events it planted its four feet firmly on the ground in the middle of the road near Nelson’s Monument, and for more .than two hours steadily contemplated the hero of Trafalgar Bay. Landseer’s lions, a few yards away, were scarcely more immovable. Politely hut firmly it declined to budge an inch. Neither whip nor words had the slightest effect on the horse, which seemed to have become rooted to the stop. Soon Charing Cross was a solid mass of omnibuses, cabs, carts, and carriages with crowds ten deep fringing the edge. There could not have been more interest and curiosity had Nelson’s statue fallen from its airy pedestal. One hour, two hours slipped by, but the animal held its ground, arching its neck like a Velasquez charger, and scarcely deigning to notice the wild turmoil it had caused. As the last resource the beast was unharnessed, the van'was pushed _ back, and a dozen men strove to lift the animal bodily from the ground. To no purpose, “The Guard dies; it never surrenders” the horse said with its eyes as plainly as if it had ottered the quotation. Die it did, for at the end of two hours and a half the police decided to send for a veterinary surgeon with a gnu.