Man has an inward voice as well as an “inward eye,”[1] a voice distinct from that of conscience. It is the companion, if not “the bliss of solitude;”[1] and though he sometimes employs it to deceive himself, it gives him good counsel perhaps quite as often, calls him to account, reproves him for having left unsaid what he ought to have said, or for having said what he ought not to have said, reprehends or approves, admonishes or encourages. On this occasion it was a joyful and gratulatory voice, with which the Doctor spake mentally, first to Nobs and afterwards to himself, as he rode back to Doncaster. [Footnote 1: WORDSWORTH.] By this unuttered address the reader would perceive, if he should haply have forgotten what was intimated in some of the ante-initial chapters, and in the first post-initial one, that the Doctor had a horse, named Nobs; and the question Who was Nobs, would not be necessary, if this were all that was to be said concerning him. There is much to be said; the tongue that could worthily express his merits, had need be like the pen of a ready writer; though I will not say of him as Berni or Boiardo has said of _quel valeroso e bel destriero,_ Argalia's horse, Rubicano, that _Un che volesse dir lodando il vero, Bisogno aria di parlar piu ch' umano._ At present, however, I shall only say this in his praise, he was altogether unlike the horse of whom it was said he had only two faults, that of being hard to catch, and that of being good for nothing when he was caught. For whether in stable or in field, Nobs would come like a dog to his master's call. There was not a better horse for the Doctor's purpose in all England; no, nor in all Christendom; no, nor in all Houyhnhnmdom, if that country had been searched to find one. _Cæsarem vehis_, said Cæsar to the Egyptian boatman. But what was that which the Egyptian boat carried, compared to what Nobs bore upon that saddle to which constant use had given its polish bright and brown? _Virtutem solidi pectoris hospitam Idem portat equus, qui dominum._[2] Nobs therefore carried—all that is in these volumes; yea, and as all future generations were, according to Madame Bourignon, actually as well as potentially, contained in Adam,—all editions and translations of them, however numerous. [Footnote 2: CASIMIR.]