Drury Lane also struck a blow at the “horse spectacles” of the rival house.  In 1812 was produced “Quadrupeds; or, The Manager’s Last Kick.”  This was only a revised version of the old burlesque of “The Tailors, a Tragedy for Warm Weather,” usually ascribed to Foote.  In the last scene an army of tailors appeared, mounted on asses and mules, and much fun of a pantomimic kind ensued.  Some years later, however, Drury Lane was content to derive profit from a drama in which “real horses” appeared, with the additional attraction of “real water.”  This was Moncrieff’s play of “The Cataract of the Ganges.”  Indeed, Drury Lane was but little entitled to vaunt its superiority in the matter.  In 1803 its treasury had greatly benefited from the feats of the “real dog” in Reynolds’s melodrama “The Caravan.”  “Real water,” indeed, had been brought upon the stage by Garrick himself, who owed his prosperity, not more to his genius as an actor than to his ingenuity as a purveyor of pantomime and spectacles.  One of his addresses to his audience contains the lines—­

    What eager transport stares from every eye,
    When pulleys rattle and our genii fly,
    When tin cascades like falling waters gleam,
    Or through the canvas bursts the real stream,
    While thirsty Islington laments in vain
    Half her New River rolled to Drury Lane.

Of late years a change has come over the equestrian drama.  The circus flourishes, and quadrupeds figure now and then upon the stage, but the “horse spectacle” has almost vanished.  The noble animal is to be seen occasionally on the boards, but he is cast for small parts only, is little better than a four-footed supernumerary.  He comes on to aid the pageantry of the scene; even opera does not disdain his services in this respect.  A richly-caparisoned charger performs certain simple duties in “Masaniello,” in “Les Huguenots,” “L’Etoile du Nord,” “Martha,” “La Juive,” and some few other operas.  The late M. Jullien introduced quite a troop of cavalry in his “Pietro il Grande,” but this homage to horseflesh notwithstanding, the world did not greatly prize the work in question.  The horse no longer performs “leading business.”  Plays are not now written for him.  He is no longer required to evince the fidelity and devotion of his nature by knocking at street-doors, rescuing a prisoned master, defending oppressed innocence, or dying in the centre of the stage to slow music.  Something of a part seemed promised him when the popular drama of “Flying Scud” was first represented; at least, he supplied that work with its title.  But it was speedily to be perceived that animal interests had been subordinated to human.  More prominent occupation by far was assigned to the rider than to the horse.  A different plan of distributing parts prevailed when “The High-mettled Racer” and kindred works adorned the stage.  A horse with histrionic instincts and acquirements had something like a chance then.  But now he can only lament the decline of the equestrian drama.  True, the circus is still open to him; but in the eyes of a well-educated performing horse a circus must be much what a music-hall is in the opinion of a tragedian devoted to five-act plays.