146 THE HORSE. 
There are many cases in which the first produce of a mare has been her 
best; such as, in former times, Mark Anthony, Conductor, Shuttle Pope, 
Filho da Puta, Sultan, Pericles, Oiseau, Doctor Syntax, Manfred, and 
Pantaloon. Nevertheless, these may be considered to be exceptions, and 
a large majority of the brood mares in the Stud-book are credited with 
their most successful produce subsequently to their first. The rule 
generally adopted is to wait till the mare is three years old before breeding 
from her, and then to put her to a horse of at least full maturity—that 
is to say, seven or elght years old. 
THE INFLUENCE OF THE SIRE AND DAM RESPECTIVELY. 
I HAVE ALREADY at page 23 alluded to this question as relating to the 
breeding of the Arab horse in his native country, and have thére shown 
that the opinions held by Abd-el-Kader in modern days do not coincide 
with those which have long been supposed to be general in Arabia. In 
the passage which I have there quoted, this celebrated chief attempts to 
define the exact part which each parent takes in producing the foal, but 
he goes still farther in subsequent answers to the questions asked by 
General Daumas, in relation to the value put by the Arabs on their 
stallions and mares respectively. To these Abd-el-Kader replies as 
follows: “It is true that Arabs prefer mares to horses, but only for the 
following reasons: the first is that they look at the profit which may 
arise from a mare as very considerable. Some Arabs have realized as 
much as 20,000 dollars from the produce of one mare. They have a 
proverb that ‘the fountainhead of riches is a mare that produces a mare. 
This is corroborated by the Prophet Mahomet, who says ‘Let mares be 
preferred, their bellies are a treasure, their backs the seat of honour.’ 
‘The greatest blessing is an intelligent wife or a mare that produces 
plenty of foals.’ These words are thus explained by commentators. 
Their bellies are a treasure because the mare by her produce increases the 
riches of her master; and their backs are the seat of honour because the 
pace of a mare is easier than that of a horse ; and there be those that say 
it is sufficiently so as in time to render a horseman effeminate. The 
second reason is that a mare does not neigh in war, that she bears hunger, 
thirst, and heat better than a horse, and that therefore she is more useful 
to people whose riches consist in camels and sheep. Now all the world 
knows that our camels and sheep thrive only in the desert, where the soil 
is so arid that Arabs drinking chiefly milk find water seldom oftener than 
every eight or ten days, in consequence of the distances between the 
pasturages, which are only to be found in the neighbourhood :f wells. 
The mare is like the serpent, their powers increase in hot weather and in 
arid countries. Serpents which live in cold or watery countries have 
little venom or courage, so that their bite is seldom mortal, whereas those 
that live in hot countries are more irritable, and the virulence of their 
poison is increased. Whilst the horse can less easily bear the heat of 
the sun, the mare, doubtless from constitutional causes, finds her energies 
increase with the greatest heat. The third reason is that the mare 
requires less care and less nourishment. ‘The owner can lead and turn 
her out to graze with the sheep and camels, and he is not obliged to have 
a person constantly watching her; whereas a horse cannot do without 
being highly fea, and he cannot be turned out without an attendant for 
obvious reasons. These are the true reasons of an Arab’s preference for 
mares. It does not arise from the foal inheriting the qualities of the dam 
