An intimate of Bowie, and a firm patron and friend of Forrest, teaching him much by precept in answer to his inquiries, and contagiously imparting to him yet more by personal contact and example, was Colonel Macaire. The real name of this man, and also those of the two succeeding members of the group, are replaced here by fictitious ones on account of their relatives who are still living. The two most prominent traits of Macaire in social life were his enthusiasm for the military art and his extreme fondness for horses. He was a finished soldier and officer. The martial discipline had left its results plainly all through his mind and his person, in a sensitive loyalty to the code of honor, an easy precision of movement, and an authoritative suavity of demeanor. The military art, on the whole, regarded in its influences on individuals and nations, is perhaps the richest in its power and the most exact in its methods of all the disciplines thus far developed in history. Its drill, faithfully applied to a fair subject, nourishes the habit of obedience and the faculty of command, regulates and refines the behavior, lifts the head, throws back the shoulders, brings out the chest, deepens the breathing, frees the circulation, and through its marching time-beat exalts the rank of the organism by co-ordinating its functions in a spirit of rhythm. It changes the contracted and fixed action of the muscles for an action flowing over the shoulders and hips and drawing on the spinal column instead of the brain. And every work which can be shifted from the brain to the spine is a mental economy especially needed in these days of excessive mental action and deficient vital action. Macaire was a great expert in horses, ever to be found where the best thoroughbreds were to be seen, attending races with the most avid relish. And it is well known that hardly anything else is so effective in imparting vitality and courage to a man as the habit of sympathetic contact with horses, looking at them, breathing with them, handling them, driving them. The popular instinct says they give their magnetism to their keepers. The fact is, the vibrations of the blood and nerves of the animal are communicated to those of the man and strengtheningly mix with them. The evil connected with this good is that the companionship often not only imparts vital force and courage but likewise stimulates the coarser animal passions. The tendency, however, is neutralized in the man of refinement.