WILD HORSES. 263 



and thighs ; the animal is well ribbed up and the feet look good. 

 The picture of the mustang exhibited reminds us of a thorough- 

 bred circus horse let loose, aud is evidently a flight of imagination 

 on the part of the artist. Youatt, in speaking of the wild horse of 

 South America, mentions him as possessing much of the form of the 

 Spanish horse from which he sprang, as not remarkable for speed, 

 but wonderfully enduring, and knowing no pace between a walk and 

 a gallop. Spence, in his "Land of Bolivar," speaks of them as 

 "small, strong built, and capable of enduring any amount of fatigue."* 

 Unsoundness of hoof of the wild horse is not often seen, but its 

 general infrequence under natural influences contrasts markedly 

 with the terrible frequency of foot lameuess, in spite of all care, 

 among domesticated horses. It teaches us the important lesson to 

 get the natural wear and bearing as much as possible, but must not 

 be misled, as by some, into teaching that the domesticated horse 

 should go unshod. According to the latter argument pushed to its 

 logical conclusion, our horses should be fed only on grass and never 

 be groomed I 



The original colour of the horse has been a subject of much 

 •debate, and seems to have been pretty generally accepted that the 

 primitive horse was dun. Martin Duncan says the evidence on 

 this point dates back as far as the time of Alexander the Great : 

 that the wild horses of Western Asia and of Eastern Europe are 

 d,un, and tkat the duns much predominate among some unmixed 

 breeds, such as those of Hungary and Norway, f It will be seen that 

 the arguments of the learned professor are weak in the extreme. 

 Whether or not the historians of Alexander the Great saio wild 

 horses I can't say, but I consider it extremely probable that they 

 saw only wild asses of Persia, Assyria, Sciude and even, possibly, 

 the Kyang in the Punjab. Again, I doubt very much whether 

 colours were recorded with as great discrimination by those histo.- 



.* ; 



* There was nearly half a century between when Youatt and Spence wrote ; the 

 stamp of the South American horse may materially have altered in that time. 



f I am indebted to Mr. F. Stockinger, Consul-General for Austro-Hungary ia 

 Bombay, for the following interesting information on Hungarian horses, as conveyed, 

 to me in a letter received since the paper on "Wild Horses" was read : — -'The Hungarian 

 is certainly one of the best mixed breeds on the surface of the earth, as the Government 

 and private persons have for more than a century imported Arabs, English, Spanish, 

 Norman, and other blood for breeding purposes ; in fact, half to three-fourth of 

 the blood in the Hungarian horse is foreign. A commission of landowners and 

 officers visits periodically every part of the country and select-? the stallions best 

 suited for the place. The thoroughly Hungarian city of Debreezin owns a stud 

 in which they pride themselves to have preserved the original Hungarian horse in 

 its primitive state unmixed with other blood. I have visited that stud * * and found 

 ?-hat the hgrsp^ are, without exception, bays ><r brown." 



