156 NATURE AND SPORT IN SOUTH AFRICA 



plains (sometimes considerable mountains, as in the 

 case of the true zebra), fresh air, and almost constant 

 sunlight. 



Although the fossilized bones of the earliest 

 modern type of horse (and therefore the general 

 shape) are well authenticated, the colour, markings, 

 and external characteristics are quite unknown. 

 Upon this head we can only theorize or guess. 

 Darwin, in his Variations of Animals and Plants 

 under Domestication , seems to have formed a strong 

 opinion that there is a " probability of the descent 

 of all the existing races from a single dun-coloured, 

 more or less striped primitive stock, to which our 

 horses occasionally revert ; " and indeed there seems 

 to be a pretty general consensus of opinion in this 

 direction. The zebra group, a manifestly pure and 

 very ancient type, unaltered by selection or by 

 breeding experiments while in captivity, may be 

 cited as strong presumptive evidence of a striped 

 ancestry of the present equine race. Even after 

 thousands of years of domestication, horses, asses, 

 and mules in all parts of the world manifest a strong 

 tendency to revert to stripings. In horses this 

 tendency occurs oftenest in duns, mouse-duns, 

 creams, and yellows, which Darwin after infinite 

 research selected as the probable colour of the 

 primitive stock. In Norway, where the majority 

 of the small hardy horses are of dun-coloured stock. 



