100 INTRODUCTION. 



poems once suspended in the Kaaba, all reported to 

 have dated before the era of Mohammed, we find 

 in Amriolkais, Amru, and Antar, animated and 

 technical descriptions of the horse, splendid pictures 

 of cavalry battles, and notices, which attest that 

 the nation had their noble breeds from their ances- 

 tors. They are written with all the feeling of con- 

 noisseurs habituated for ages to excellent horses, 

 and show a thorough knowledge of what constitutes 

 their best qualities. Finally, if the Arabs had been 

 without horses, had not possessed them in abun- 

 dance, and of the best quality, at the time of their 

 uniting under the sway of the Koran, no enthu- 

 siasm could have suddenly transformed mere herds- 

 men into the best and most daring cavalry of their 

 era, or enabled them in a few campaigns to crush 

 the enormous mounted armies of the Sassanian Par- 

 thians and the disciplined science of Eastern Rome ; 

 none but a people long in possession of numerous 

 and well trained chargers could have given wings 

 to the sword of Islam, and in sixty years planted 

 its victorious banners on the Pyrenees and on the 

 banks of the Ganges. 



Nevertheless, in these researches, no proofs of an 

 indigenous wild race of horses can be traced, nor, as 

 already mentioned, does the nature of the region 

 and of the vicinity offer the requisite conditions for 

 maintaining them. It is to care in breeding and 

 crossing imported races of animals, to attention in 

 selecting the finest forms, that Arabia owes the 

 celebrity of its studs. Evidently Egypt, Persia, 



