THE MULES. 343 



themselves being of remote hybrid descent ; because 

 any disturbing action in the regular filiation of their 

 progeny reproduced indications of a more decided 

 system of variegated painting on the true horses 

 and superadded cross bars on the joints, neither of 

 which occur or are conspicuous in the quagga. 



Already, in the time of Buffon, the idea of pro- 

 ducing mules from the striped species of Equida? 

 had occurred. Lord Clive, in experiments to effect 

 this purpose, had found it necessary to deceive a 

 female zebra by painting a male ass with hippoti- 

 grine stripes. No such precautions, it appears from 

 Frederick Cuvier's remarks, were subsequently de- 

 manded at the Menagerie du Roi at Paris; here 

 the hybrid result was a powerful slate- coloured 

 animal with but scanty marks of the zebra dam in 

 his livery ; as often occurs in the first descent, 

 when in the second they are much more conspicuous. 

 In a second instance, we do not know, but the sire 

 appears to have been zebra and the dam an ass ; 

 for the structure indicates her form, and the more 

 conspicuous strias the parental livery. See Plate 

 XXVIII. 



With regard to the quagga mule, Plate XXIX., 

 we detect in the figure a more powerful animal, but 

 its subsequent history is not known to us. Equine 

 mules, though there are both ancient and modern 

 attestations to the contrary, may be justly regarded 

 as unable to continue their race: the Paris zebra 

 mule likewise evinced an indifference, which, in the 

 course of a long life and ample food, proved a simU 



