PREHISTORIC AND EARLY HORSES 9 



in 1519 in what is now Mexico, was the first to 

 bring horses to the mainland. They were the 

 wonder of the Indians who believed that they 

 were fabulous creatures from the sun. The wild 

 horses of Mexico and Peru were no doubt de- 

 scended from the escaped war horses of the Span- 

 ish soldiers slain in battle. These escaped horses 

 reproduced rapidly, and the plains became popu- 

 lous with them. So, also, with the horses aban- 

 doned by De Soto, who returned from his Missis- 

 sippi expedition in boats leaving his horses be- 

 hind. Professor Osborn of the American Museum 

 of Natural History, has recently been conducting 

 explorations in Mexico, studying the wild horses 

 there, and his conclusions are proof of the accur- 

 acy of the surmises which have been made by the 

 historians of the early Spanish adventurers. 



Flanders horses were brought to New York in 

 1625 and English horses to Massachusetts in 

 1629. Previous to these importations, however, 

 English horses had been landed in Virginia, and 

 in 1647 the first French horses reached Canada, 

 being landed at the still very quaint village of Ta- 

 dousac. Indeed, during all the colonial times 



