ERGOT— EVOLUTION OF THE HORSE 



Ergot is one of the fungi which attacks grasSj and if 

 eaten by an in-foal mare is Hkely to produce abortion. The 

 flowering head of the grass is its usual seat, and is so 

 frequently met with in rye that the two have come to be 

 associated with each other, but all large seeded grasses are 

 attacked by ergot. It appears in the late summer and early 

 autumn, and no in-foal mares should be turned out on any 

 pasture where its existence is suspected. Ergot eaten in 

 large quantities produces poisonous effects, such as severe 

 colicky pains, purging, and breaking out on the lips. The 

 animal subsequently falls into a comatose state, and as a 

 rule paralysis sets in, the hind-quarters being generally the 

 first part attacked. 



Escutcheon. — The division of hair which begins below 

 the point of the hips and extends downwards on the flanks. 



Evolution of the Horse. — The present-day horse is 

 generally supposed by Darwin and other noted scientists 

 to be descended from an animal no larger than a fox, 

 christened by Professor Owen " the hyracotherium," which 

 existed in the Eocene period, about 3,300,000 years ago. 

 At all events fossils found in Devonshire, America, and 

 elsewhere show that a true horse, more akin to ours in size, 

 certainly inhabited the world in the Great Ice Age before 

 the present oceanic divisions acted as barriers. The first 

 horses of which traces remain were the five-toed Eocene 

 species that developed into a three-toed race most probably 

 dun-coloured. Three million years elapsed, during the latter 

 part of which man hunted horses for food, until in the 

 Neolithic, or Newer Stone Age, attempts appear to have 

 been made to domesticate them, though it is thought that 

 they were corralled for reserve food before this period ; they 

 were by this time about 1 3 hands in height. At first they were 

 used by the Solutrians — who occupied a tract of land on 

 the Soane, to the north of Lyons in France — as pack-horses, 

 and no attempt was made to breed from them. Interesting 



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