“Frankly,” I said, “when I look at that thing, I feel somehow incapable of thought.” “I rather imagined that it would take your eye,” replied Hawkins, complacently. “Now, just see the simplicity of the thing, Griggs. Drop your childish prejudices for a minute and examine it. “Let us suppose that this brake is fitted to a fiery saddle-horse. The rider has lost all control. In another minute, unless he can stop the beast, he will be dashed to the ground and kicked into pulp. What does he do? Simply pulls this lever--thus! The animal can't budge!” An uncanny clankety-clankety-clank accompanied his words, and the rods dropped suddenly. In their descent they somehow managed to gather two steel cuffs apiece. When they ceased dropping, Maud S. had a steel bar down the back of each leg, with a cuff above and a cuff below the knee. Hawkins was quite right--so far as I could see; Maud was anchored until some well-disposed person brought a hack-saw and cut off her shackles. “You see how it acts when she is standing still?” chuckled the inventor, replacing the rods. “Just keep your eyes open and note the suddenness with which she stops running.” “Hawkins,” I cried, despairingly, as he led the animal up the road, “don't go to all that trouble on my account. I can see perfectly that the thing is a success. Don't try it again.” “My dear Griggs,” said Hawkins, coldly, “this trial trip is for my own personal satisfaction, not yours. To tell the truth, I had no idea that you or any one else would be here to witness my triumph.” He went perhaps three or four hundred feet up the road; then he turned Maud's nose homeward and clambered to her back. As I waited behind the hedge, I grieved for the old mare. Hawkins evidently intended urging her into something more rapid than the walk she had used for so many years, and I feared that at her advanced age the excitement might prove injurious. But Maud broke into such a sedate canter when Hawkins had thumped her ribs a few times with his heels, and her kindly old face seemed to wear such a gentle expression as she approached, that I breathed easier. “Now, Griggs!” cried Hawkins, coming abreast. “Watch--now!” He thrust one hand behind, grasped the lever, and gave it a tug. The little rods remained in the air. A puzzled expression flitted over Hawkins' face, and as he cantered by he appeared to tug a trifle harder. This time something happened. I heard a whir like the echo of a sawmill, and saw several yards of steel spring shoot out of the inwards of the machine. I heard a sort of frantic shriek from Maud S. I saw a sudden cloud of pebbles and dust in the road, such as I should imagine would be kicked up by an exploding shell--and that was all. Hawkins, Maud, and the infernal machine were making for the county town with none of the grace, but nearly all the speed, of a shooting star. For a few seconds I stood dazed.