Encouraged by her master's voice and hand, Black Bess started forward at a pace which few horses could have equalled, and scarcely any have sustained so long. Even Dick, accustomed as he was to her magnificent action, felt electrified at the speed with which he was borne along. "Bravo! bravo!" shouted he, "hark away, Bess!" The deep and solemn woods through which they were rushing rang with his shouts, and the sharp rattle of Bess's hoofs; and thus he held his way, while, in the words of the ballad, Fled past, on right and left, how fast, Each forest, grove, and bower; On right and left, fled past, how fast, Each city, town, and tower. _CHAPTER VI_ _BLACK BESS_ _Dauphin._ I will not change my horse with any that treads but on four pasterns. _Ca, ha!_ He bounds from the earth as if his entrails were hairs; _le cheval volant_, the Pegasus _qui a les narines de feu_! When I bestride him, I soar, I am a hawk: he trots the air; the earth sings when he touches it; the basest horn of his hoof is more musical than the pipe of Hermes. SHAKESPEARE: _Henry V., Act III._ Black Bess being undoubtedly the heroine of the Fourth Book of this Romance, we may, perhaps, be pardoned for expatiating a little in this place upon her birth, parentage, breeding, appearance, and attractions. And first as to her pedigree; for in the horse, unlike the human species, nature has strongly impressed the noble or ignoble caste. He is the real aristocrat, and the pure blood that flows in the veins of the gallant steed will infallibly be transmitted, if his mate be suitable, throughout all his line. Bess was no _cock-tail_. She was thorough-bred; she boasted blood in every bright and branching vein: If blood can give nobility, A noble steed was she; Her sire was blood, and blood her dam, And all her pedigree.