THE HORSE. 



217 



for their marcs, they borrow from their neigh- 

 bours, paying a proper price, as with us, and 

 receive a written attestation of the whole. 

 In this attestation is contained the name of 

 the horse and the mare, and their respective 

 genealogies. When the mare has produced 

 her foal, new witnesses are called, and a new 

 attestation signed, in which are described the 

 marks of the foal, and the day noted when it 

 was brought forth. These attestations increase 

 the value of the horse ; and they are given to 

 the person who buys him. The most ordina- 

 ry mare of this race sells for five hundred 

 crowns ; there are many that sell for a thou- 

 sand ; and some of the very finest kinds for 

 fourteen or fifteen hundred pounds. As the 

 Arabians have no other house but a tent to 

 live in, this also serves them for a stable ; so 

 that the mare, the foal, the husband, the wife, 

 and the children, lie all together indiscrimi- 

 nately : the little children are often seen upon 

 the body or the neck of the mare, while these 

 continue inoffensive and harmless, permitting 

 them thus to play with and caress them with- 

 out any injury. The Arabians never beat 

 their horses ; they treat them gently ; they 

 speak to them, and seem to hold a discourse; 

 they use them as friends ; they never attempt 

 to increase their speed by the whip, nor spur 

 them, but in cases of necessity. However, 

 when this happens, they set off with amazing 

 swiftness ; they leap over obstacles with as 

 much agility as a buck ; and if the rider hap- 

 pens to fall, they are so manageable that they 

 stand still in the midst of their most rapid ca- 

 reer. The Arabian horses are of a middle 

 size, easy in their motions, and rather inclin- 

 ed to leanness than fat. They are regular- 

 ly dressed every morning and evening, and 

 with such care that the smallest roughness is 

 not left upon their skins. They wash the legs, 

 the mane, and the tail, which they never cut; 

 and which they seldom comb, lest they should 

 thin the hair. They give them nothing to eat 

 during the day; they only give them to drink 

 once or twice ; and at sun-set they hang a bag 

 to their heads, in which there is about half a 

 bushel of clean barley. They continue eating 

 the "whole night, and the bag is again taken 

 away the next morning. They are turned out 

 to pasture in the beginning of March, when 

 the grass is pretty high, and at which time 



the mares are given to the stallion. When 

 the spring is past, they take them again from 

 pasture, and they get neither grass nor hay 

 during the rest of the year; barley is their 

 only food, except now and then a little straw. 

 The mane of the fo;\l is always clipped when 

 about a year or eighteen months old, in order 

 to make it stronger and thicker. They be- 

 gin to break them at two years old, or two 

 years and a half at farthest ; they never sad- 

 dle or bridle them till at that age; and then 

 they are always kept ready saddled at the 

 door of the tent, from morning till sun-set, in 

 order to be prepared against any surprise. 

 They at present seem sensible of the great ad- 

 vantage their horses are to the country ; there 

 is a law, therefore, that prohibits the expor- 

 tation of the mares ; and such stallions as are 

 brought into England are generally purchased 

 on the eastern shores of Africa, and come 

 round to us by the Cape of Good Hope. 

 They are in general less in stature than our 

 own, being not above fourteen, or fourteen 

 hands and a half high : their motions are much 

 more graceful and swifter than of our own 

 horses; but, nevertheless, their speed is far 

 from being equal ; they run higher from the 

 ground ; their stroke is not so long and close ; 

 and they are far inferior in bottom. Still, how- 

 ever, they must be considered as the first and 

 finest breed in the world, and that from which 

 all others have derived their principal quali- 

 fications. It is even probable that Arabia is 

 the original country of horses ; since there, 

 instead of crossing the breed, they take every 

 precaution to keep it entire. In other coun- 

 tries they must continually change the races, 

 or their horses would soon degenerate; but 

 there the same blood has passed down through 

 a long succession, without any diminution 

 either of force or beauty. 



The race of Arabian horses has spread it- 

 self into Barbary, among the Moors, and has 

 even extended across that extensive continent 

 to the western shores of Africa. Among the 

 negroes of Gambia and Senegal, the chiefs of 

 the country are possessed of horses, which, 

 though little, are very beautiful, and extreme- 

 ly manageable. Instead of barley, they are 

 fed in those countries with maise bruised and 

 reduced into meal, and mixed up with milk 

 when they design to fatten them. These are 



