_Whan he rood, men might his bridel heere_ _Gyngle in a whistlyng wynd so cleere,_ _And eek as lowde as doth the chapel belle._ --Cant. Tales, l. 169. The rider is seldom furnished with a whip, because he urged his steed forward with his spurs; but female riders and persons of lower degree have often whips, which generally consist of several lashes, each having usually a knob at the end. Such a whip is seen in our cut No. 213, taken from a manuscript of the thirteenth century in the British Museum (MS. Arundel. No. 91), which represents a countryman driving a horse of burthen; and he not only uses the whip, but he tries further to urge him on by twisting his tail. A whip with one lash--rather an unusual example--is in the hand of the woman driving the cart in our cut No. 214, which is taken from a manuscript of the romance of “Meliadus,” in the French National Library (No. 6961), belonging to the fourteenth century. The lady here is also evidently riding astride. The cart in which she is carrying home the wounded knight is of a simple and rude construction. As yet, indeed, carriages for travelling were very little in use; and to judge by the illuminations, they were only employed for kings and very powerful nobles in ceremonial processions. [Illustration: _No. 213. A Horsewhip._] The horse was, after a man’s own limbs, his primary agent of locomotion. Perhaps no animal is so intimately mixed up with the history of mankind as the horse--certainly none more so. Our Anglo-Saxon forefathers travelled much on foot, and, as far as we know, the great importance in which the horse was held in the middle ages in this part of the world, began with feudalism, and the best and most celebrated breed of horses in Europe, from the earliest ages of chivalry, was brought from the East. The heroes of early romance and poetry are generally mounted on _Arab_ steeds, and these have often the additional merit of having been won by conquest from the Saracens. In the thirteenth century they were obtained from Turkey and Greece; and at a later period from Barbary. France, also, had its native breed, which enjoyed a high reputation for many valuable qualities, and especially for its fierceness in war; Gascony, and, on the other side of the Spanish frontier, Castile and Aquitaine, were much celebrated for their horses. The Gascons prided themselves much on their horses, and they displayed this pride sometimes in a very singular manner. In 1172, Raymond de Venous, count of Toulouse, held a grand _cour plénière_, and, as a display of ostentation, caused thirty of his horses to be burnt in presence of the assembly. It was a fine example of the barbarity of feudalism. At the provincial synod of Auch, held in 1303, it was ordered that archdeacons, when they made their diocesan circuits, should not go with more than five horses, which shows that the Gascon clergy were in the habit of making a great display of cavalry.