Ill] AND HISTORIC TIMES 265 



horses of North America. Again, whilst the Pampas horses 

 show a remarkable uniformity of colour, it was very different 

 with their kindred in the North, for they appear to have worn 

 coats of many colours in the vast area over which they 

 ranged from Mexico to the Red River (since, according to 

 Dr Richardson \ they never seem to have advanced beyond 

 the 52nd or 53rd degree of latitude). Thus, according to 

 Catling these wild horses were of all colours — black, grey, roan, 

 and roan pied with sorrel — and F. Micheaux^ describes two wild 

 horses from Mexico as roan, whilst Darwin^ on the authority of 

 Dr Canfield says that in certain parts they are mostly duns 

 and striped, and Osborn states that " in Mexico and various 

 other parts of America, the descendants of the horses in- 

 troduced by the Spaniards are frequently of a dun colour 

 with distinct dorsal, shoulder, and leg stripes^" Since Darwin 

 adduced these dun-coloured horses of Mexico as cases of 

 reversion to the dun colour of a primitive ancestor, and as the 

 same horses are still being constantly cited in support of the 

 same doctrine, it is most important that we should ascertain as 

 far as possible the history of the horses of Spanish descent 

 in Mexico and other parts of North America. This is all the 

 more desirable in view of the facts which we have already 

 elicited concerning the striped horses of Java and the dun- 

 coloured and striped horses of Kattywar also cited by Darwin, 

 and generally accepted without question as instances of the 

 survival of or reversion to the primeval livery of the horse. 

 It will be noticed that the contention of Darwin and others — 

 that in the dun-coloured horses of Mexico and Texas we have 

 instances of reversion — assumes that no horses of a dun-colour 

 and having stripes were introduced into North America by the 

 Spaniards. In fact Darwin tacitly assumed that as the Pampas 

 horses are all sprung from Andalusian horses which are normally 

 of a dark colour, the Spaniards brought none others than dark 



^ Fauna Boreali-Americana (1829), p. 231. 



- Indian Tribes, Vol. ii. p. 57 (cited by Darwin). 



2 Travels in North America (Eng. trans.), p. 23-5 (cited by Darwin). 



■* Variation, Vol. i. p. 64. 



5 The Century Magazine, November, 1904, p. 14. 



