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THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



while the ass is hard to raise in the north of France, and can not 

 live in Sweden. Furthermore, wild horses were still living, in 

 the sixteenth century, in the Yosges Mountains, as was said by 

 Elisee Roesslin, of Haguenau, in a book published at Strasburg 

 in 1593 : "Among the animals that are met in the Vosges, first to 

 be noticed, which would be a marvel in many countries, are the 

 wild horses. They keep in the forests and the mountains, pro- 

 viding their own support, and breeding and increasing at all sea- 

 sons. In winter they hunt for a shelter under the rocks, feeding, 

 like large game, on the brooms, heaths, and branches of trees. 

 They are wilder and more savage than are the deer of many 

 countries, and as hard to capture as they. Men become masters 

 of them, as with the deer, by the aid of the lakes. When they 

 have succeeded in taming and subduing them — a long and difficult 

 task — they have horses of the best quality. These horses with- 

 stand the severest cold and are satisfied with the coarsest food. 

 Their walk is sure, their footing firm and solid, because they are 

 accustomed, like the chamois, to run over the mountains and leap 

 the rocks. If the Vosges support wild horses, while the Black 



Forest has no such animals, 

 they owe the privilege to 

 their northern exposure, 

 their sterility, and the 

 prevalence of fierce north 

 winds." Wild horses exist- 

 ed at the same time in the 

 Swiss Alps and in Prussia 

 (Erasmus Stella, 1518), and 

 their . flesh was eaten as in 

 the Quaternary epoch. Un- 

 fortunately, no description 

 or picture of these animals 

 is left us ; and although 

 Bishop Fortunat speaks of them as onagras, he was most probably 

 speaking of horses that had become wild — the tarpans — and not 

 real wild horses like Equus Prejevalskii. 



The engraving we give of the Prejevalski horse was made 

 from the type of the species in the Museum of the Academy of 

 Sciences of St. Petersburg, and has been obtained from Prof. 

 Eugen Buchner, director of the museum. It is a reproduction 

 of the figure accompanying Poliakoff's memoir in the publications 

 of the Russian Imperial Geographical Society. 



We also give, for comparison, the figure (2) of a species of he- 

 mione, the Syrian hemippus (Equus liemippus), purposely chosen 

 because it is the species most like the horse in its elegant form 

 and the small size of its ears. This picture is an exact copy of a 



Fig. 3. — Fac-simile of an Engraving on Bone, 

 representing a horse with a brush tail and 

 Erect Mane. (Cave of Lorthet-Fouilles, by M. 

 Piette.) 



