DOMESTIC ANIMALS IN INDIA. 



603 



closer bond by residence in India, where everybody rides — or ought 

 to ride — where horses and horse-keep are cheap, and where large 

 castes of stable servants, contented with a low wage, are capable, 

 Tinder careful superintendence, of keeping their animals in a state 

 of luxurious comfort. The horses, however, which serve native 

 masters are born to purgatory rather than to paradise. Those in 

 the hands of the upper classes suffer from antiquated and bar- 

 barous systems of treatment, and are often killed by mistaken 

 kindness or crippled by bad training, while those of low degree 

 are liable to cruel ill-usage, overwork, neglect, and unrelieved 

 bondage. 



Fig. 7.— a Eajah's Charger (Marwar Breed). 



The "thorn-bits" here engraved are ordinary specimens of 

 those in use; the cut requires careful examination before their 

 murderous character can be made out. Some say the Indian bit 

 is severe because the average horseman, being of slight build, is 

 physically incapable of holding a horse with a fair one. There 

 may be something in this, but the weakness is more moral than 

 physical ; nerve is more wanting than muscle, and reason most 

 of all. 



