202 VARIETIES OF THE HORSE 



a colt by a Seglawi horse and a Keheilan mare would be styled a Keheilan, 

 and would rank as a first-class Arab of untarnished pedigree. On the 

 other hand, if a mare belonging to this class should be mated with a 

 horse of inferior blood, or in any respect other than a member of her 

 own rank, she and her foals are at once transferred to the second class; 

 whilst the third class is composed of animals which, though possessing 

 relationship with the highest order, are still further removed from them 

 in blood, mis-marked foals of good breeding, and the like. Affixes are 

 used to denote the best specimens of the five great families, and are also 

 applied to the animals of the second class. As may be supposed, sub- 

 families have sprung up which have taken their names from their founders, 

 such as the Seglawi Jedran, one of the most sought-for classes; and though, 

 perhaps, the Keheilans are the most numerous, the best type of Arabs is 

 the Nejdean, though it is becoming rare. 



Many owners, of course, possess specimens of all the five great Aral) 

 families alluded to above, and Lady Anne Blunt, in her charming work, 

 A Pilgrimage to Nejd, alludes to the fact that in the stables of Ibu 

 Rashid at Hail, which she went over several times, there were mares of 

 the following families: — Keheilet el Krush, a 14 hands 1 inch chestnut; 

 a bay Hamdami Simri; a young Seglawi Sheyfi; a 14 hands 2 inch 

 dark bay Keheilet Ajaz; and a gray Seglawi Jedran, &c. These mares, 

 it will be noticed, all belong to the family of one of the five mares — 

 or " Al Kamsch", as they are termed in the desert — whilst the affixes show 

 the name of the breeder who founded the sub-family in which they are 

 included. Thus Seglawi Jedran implies that the mare is of the great 

 Seglawi family of Jedran's strain. 



In height the mares found by Lady Anne Blunt in the stables at 

 Had were certainly below that which would recommend them to English 

 judges of insular ideas; but, as stated above, a very great increase in 

 stature is observable amongst many animals of undoubtedly the purest 

 desert blood in this country, where Arabs of 15 hands 3 inches are not 

 unknown; similar cases have been reported from Hungary, where these 

 horses are much appreciated. It is therefore incorrect to stigmatize the 

 Arab as necessarily being a little horse, though many good judges prefer 

 . him small; and it is also a libel on the breed to reproach them with 

 being light in bone. Of course, as in the case of all varieties, some Arabs 

 are not so massive as others; many appear to be far slenderer below 

 the knee than they really are, this fact having impressed itself very 

 strongly upon the mind of the writer when he, quite unknown to the 

 owners, some of whom he had never seen, measured the girth of the 

 fore-legs of the competitors at the Crystal Palace show in 1896. In 



