“He gives his harness bells a shake…” – Who is ‘He’ referred to here? Why does he shake his harness bells according to the poet? What figure of speech is used in this line?
2 Answers
Here ‘he’ refers to the horse on which the narrator was travelling.
According to the narrator, the horse was giving a shake to his harness bells to ask him whether there was a mistake. It suggests that the narrator had never stopped there before. It was new to the horse’s experience to stop on the way in that woods.
The lines:
“He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there is some mistake.”
employs a fine piece of personification of the horse. It is addressed like a human being as ‘He’ and the verb ‘to ask’ is used to give it even more prominence.
He gives his harness bells a shake to ask if there is some mistake. This shows that the narrator had never stopped the horse there before