" The
whelp wondered at the horse's words and said to him, "Say not
thus; for it is shame for thee, seeing that thou art tall and
stout. How comes it that thou fearest the son of Adam, thou, with
thy bulk of body and thy swiftness of running, when I, for all my
littleness of body, am resolved to find out the son of Adam, and
rushing on him, eat his flesh, that I may allay the affright of
this poor duck and make her to dwell in peace in her own place.
But now thou hast wrung my heart with thy talk and turned me back
from what I had resolved to do, in that, for all thy bulk, the
son of Adam hath mastered thee and feared neither thy height nor
thy breadth, though, wert thou to kick him with thy foot, thou
wouldst kill him, nor could he prevail against thee, but thou
wouldst make him drink the cup of death." The horse laughed, when
he heard the whelp's words, and replied, "Far, far is it from my
power to overcome him, O king's son! Let not my length and my
breadth nor yet my bulk delude thee, with respect to the son
of Adam; for he, of the excess of his guile and his cunning,
fashions for me a thing called a hobble and hobbles my four legs
with ropes of palm-fibres, bound with felt, and makes me fast by
the head to a high picket, so that I remain standing and can
neither sit nor lie down, being tied up.
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