visible, and thus add artistic effect to the operation of it upon
Shargar's imagination--a faculty certainly uneducated in Shargar,
but far, very far from being therefore non-existent. It was,
indeed, actively operative, although, like that of many a fine lady
and gentleman, only in relation to such primary questions as: 'What
shall we eat? And what shall we drink? And wherewithal shall we be
clothed?' But as he lay and devoured the new 'white breid,' his
satisfaction--the bare delight of his animal existence--reached a
pitch such as even this imagination, stinted with poverty, and
frost-bitten with maternal oppression, had never conceived possible.
The power of enjoying the present without anticipation of the
future or regard of the past, is the especial privilege of the
animal nature, and of the human nature in proportion as it has not
been developed beyond the animal. Herein lies the happiness of cab
horses and of tramps: to them the gift of forgetfulness is of worth
inestimable. Shargar's heaven was for the present gained.




CHAPTER V.

THE SYMPOSIUM.

Robert had scarcely turned out of the square on his way to find
Shargar, when a horseman entered it. His horse and he were both
apparently black on one side and gray on the other, from the
snow-drift settling to windward. The animal looked tired, but the
rider sat as easy as if he were riding to cover. The reins hung
loose, and the horse went in a straight line for The Boar's Head,