94 INTRODUCTION. 



try. * In India and in Western Europe, where the 

 same colour was venerated, one or more were annu- 

 ally sacrificed to the sun, and even to other divini- 

 ties, such as Ertha in the island of Riigen. From the 

 Ganges to the Baltic, stalls for these animals existed 

 about the temples and in the sacred groves. 



As the camel had been emphatically styled the 

 ship of the desert, so was the ship denominated the 

 horse of the sea. Under the names of horse and 

 mare, the helio and lunar arkite enclosure, or kid, 

 was typified by the Celtic Druids of the fifth and 

 sixth centuries, when their ancient lore became 

 amalgamated with Gnosticism; and the eastern 

 fables of Bellerophon and Perseus had their myste- 

 rious counterparts in western initiation. 



To ancient Egypt we appear to be indebted for 

 the first systematic attention to rearing and im- 

 proving breeds of horses. Numerous carved or out- 

 lined pictures, in temples and halls, represent steeds 

 whose symmetry, beauty of outline, and even co- 

 lour, attest that they are designed from high bred 

 types, and evince the care bestowed upon them by 

 the addition of grooms, who are rubbing their 

 joints, and attend sedulously to their comfort on all 

 fitting occasions, in the same manner as is still the 

 practice in the East. In all these pictures, the 

 horses are represented harnessed to chariots ; no in- 

 stance occurring of a mounted rider, except on one 

 occasion, where the execution of the design is recog- 

 nised to belong to the Roman era. t 



* 2 Kings, xxiii. 11. 



f There axe two or three, indeed, where riders occur in 



