32 THE HORSE OF AMERICA. 



not always the companion and servant of man. Wherever he is 

 found in a feral state reasons that are amply satisfactory are 

 never wanting to account for that state. Ancient historians have 

 specially noted each of the principal countries embraced in this 

 zone for the superiority and numbers of its horses, but no one 

 has made any allusion to wild horses, nor suggested that there 

 may have been a time when their ancestors were wild. 



Now, as we have designated a long and wide region of Western 

 Asia, embracing a number of different nationalities and govern- 

 ments, as the probable original habitat of the horse, can we go 

 further and designate the particular nationality or government 

 in which was his original home and from which he was distrib- 

 uted to adjoining nations or peoples? In answer to this ques- 

 tion, we cannot present any dates of record earlier than about 

 1700 B.C., and this date will apply as well to Media and Cappa- 

 docia as to Armenia. We must, therefore, consider it in the 

 light of other facts and circumstances, not dependent upon 

 specific dates. In the first place, and taking the Mosaic account 

 of the deluge as the starting point, ''the ark rested on the moun- 

 tains of Ararat." This is the original name of a country, inter- 

 sected by a mountain range, and that range took its name from 

 the country in which it was found. "Mount Ararat" was simply 

 a very high peak in that range. The distinction should be ob- 

 served here between "the mountains of Ararat" and "Mount 

 Ararat." In the second place, it is clearly established by all his- 

 tory that near the base of this mountain range Japheth and his 

 descendants had their homes. His son Gomer was highly dis- 

 tinguished in his day, and his grandson, Togarmah, son of 

 Gomer, became a powerful chief. To such prominence did he 

 rise in the affairs of his age that for centuries after his day his 

 country was called "Togarmah." Hence we have the three 

 names, Ararat, Togarmah and Armenia applied in sacred and 

 profane history to the same country that we are now considering. 



During the continuance of the dynasty of King Haic or Haicus, 

 the son of Togarmah, the Armenians became a very prosperous 

 and powerful people. They did not seem to be an aggressive or 

 warlike people, although their boundaries were greatly extended, 

 but a thrifty agricultural and industrious people. Breeding and 

 marketing horses seem to have been their leading employments. 

 In the twenty-seventh chapter of the Prophet Ezekiel he gives a 

 catalogue of the different peoples trading with the great 



