THE MODERN AKAB. 21 
1 stone to 1 stone 7 pounds, is made in favour of Arabs as against 
imported English ‘horses, “in order to bring the two together” in racing 
parlance, yet even then few Arabs can compete with the second-rate 
horses which are imported from this country. Colonel Bower tells us that 
“in India the weights range from 74 stone to 10 stone, and no uncommon 
timing for Arabs is 2 minutes and 54 seconds the mile and a half; 
3 ‘minutes and 52 seconds the 2 miles—it has been’ done in 3 minutes 
and 48 seconds, and the Arab that did it was once my property, and his 
name was the Child of the Islands. He was a daisy-cutter, and yet I 
have ridden him over the roughest ground, and never detected him in a 
trip. A pleasanter, safer hack ‘could not be, and a fleeter Arab the world 
never saw. He stood 14 hands 2 inches, bay with black points, wiry 
limbs, very muscular all over, and measured 7? inches round a fore leg 
of the finest bone and flattest sinew.” This time is as good as that of the 
average of our Derbys, but the test is a very fallacious one, and unless 
the time is taken over the same course, and that in the same running 
condition, no comparison can possibly be drawn. 
Captain Shakspear, in his recently published work on the “ Wild 
Sports of India,” gives the following most minute description of the Arab, 
as he is now met with in India. As it differs in some particulars from 
the accounts of other observers, I extract it entire. The price of a good 
Arab, he says, varies from 1502. to 200/., and there is plenty of choice in 
the Bombay and Bengal markets. 
“The points of the highest caste Arab horse, as compared with the 
English thoroughbred, are as follow: the head is more beautifully formed, 
and more intelligent ; the forehead broader; the muzzle finer; the eye 
more prominent, more sleepy-looking in repose, more brilliant when the 
animal is excited. The ear is more beautifully pricked, and of exquisite 
shape and sensitiveness. On the back of the trained hunter, the rider 
scarcely requires to keep his eye on anything but the ears of his horse, 
which give indications of everything that his ever-watchful eye catches 
sight of. The nostril is not always so open in a state of rest, and indeed 
often looks thick and closed ; but in excitement, and when the lungs are 
in full play from the animal being at speed, it expands greatly, and the 
membrane shows scarlet and as if on fire. The game-cock throttle—that 
most exquisite formation of the throat and jaws of the blood-horse—is not 
so commonly seen in the Arab as in the thorough-bred English racehorse ; 
nor is the head quite so lean. The jaws, for the size of the head, are 
perhaps more apart, giving more room for the expansion of the windpipe. 
The point where the head is put on to the neck is quite as delicate as in 
the English horse. This junction has much more to do with the mouth 
of the horse than most people are aware of, and on it depends the pleasure 
or otherwise of the rider. The bones, from the eye down towards the 
lower part of the head, should not be too concave, or of a deer’s form ; for 
this in the Arab as in the English horse denotes a violent temper, 
though it is very beautiful to look at. Proceeding to the neck, we notice 
that the Arab stallion has rarely the crest that an English stallion has. 
He has a strong, light, and muscular neck, a little short perhaps compared 
to the other, and thick. In the pure breeds, the neck runs into the 
shoulders very gradually ; and generally, if the horse has a pretty good 
crest, comes down rather perpendicularly into the shoulders; but often, if 
he is a little ewe-necked, which is not uncommon with the Arab, it runs 
in too straight, and low down in the shoulders. The Arab, however, 
rarely carries his head, when he is being ridden, so high in proportion aa 
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