ARABIAN HORSES. 277 



leg above the hock. The children play with it, and 

 when it is a year old they mount it occasionally, and 

 thus it gradually becomes accustomed to carrying 

 weight. Before it attains two years of age it has 

 been ridden by a half-grown boy, and a year later it 

 is put through some long and severe gallops. The 

 Bedouins maintain — very unreasonably, as Western 

 experience shows — that, unless a horse has done hard 

 work before he is three years old, he will never be fit 

 to do it afterward. It may be, indeed, that Arabian 

 and " thoroughbred " horses can do hard work in 

 their colthood with impunity ; but of half-bred, still 

 more of cold-blooded horses, Shakspere's adage still 

 holds true : 



" The colt that 's backed and burdened being young 

 Loseth his pride, and never waxeth strong." 



When the Arabian colt is about two and a half 

 years old, besides being taught to gallop in the figure 

 of an 8, and to change his leg, so as to become supple, 

 he is ridden by his master on a journey. The conse- 

 quence of this heroic treatment is, that splints are not 

 uncommon in Arabian horses, and sometimes their 

 shank bones become bent permanently. Occasionally, 

 also, the colt gets a pair of broken knees by being 

 ridden over rough ground at too early an age. But, 

 strange to say, the Arabians make no account of such 

 a blemish. Their horses, when full grown, never fall, 

 despite their careless way of walking. " The Arabian 

 horse is too sure of his footing to be careful, except 

 on rough ground, and there he never makes a false 

 step." 



I own a Morgan mare which has precisely the 

 same peculiarity. On ordinary roads she will not 



