IV] THE ORIGIN OF THE LIBYAN HORSE 451 



As no one will dispute the fact that our carriage-horses, 

 riding horses and trappers are the result of a judicious blend of 

 the coarse, thick-set Asio-European horse and the thoroughbred, 

 and as it is also admitted that many of our native ponies, such 

 as the Welsh and Exmoor, have been largely mixed with North 

 African blood, the occurrence of stripes on such horses as those 

 cited by Darwin can be readily accounted for on the hypothesis 

 that the stripes are due to thoroughbred blood. In several of 

 the instances given he himself states that the animal so marked 

 was well bred, or else his description shows that such was the 

 case, so there can be no doubt of the presence of Libyan blood 

 in these animals. Our investigations have likewise shown that 

 all shades of black and chestnut are due to a blending of the 

 Libyan with the northern blood. 



28. A pony said to be Welsh, in colour mouse-black or 

 dark slate-grey, with a dorsal stripe, four stripes across the 

 withers, and one or two indistinct ones on the leg^ 



29. A chestnut-dun cart-horse had a conspicuous spinal 

 stripe, with distinct traces of shoulder stripes but none on the 

 legs. 



30. A large, heavy Belgian cart-horse, of a fallow-dun 

 colour, had a conspicuous spinal stripe and traces of leg stripes, 

 and tAvo parallel stripes on both shoulders. 



3L Another rather light cart-horse of a dirty dark cream 

 colour, with striped legs, and on one shoulder a large ill-defined 

 dark cloudy patch, and on the opposite shoulder two parallel 

 faint stripes. 



But I have already shown that the large cart-horses of 

 England have been imported from the Continent, and that 

 these large breeds were evolved by infusing the blood of the 

 Libyan horse into the little horses of Upper Europe. It has 

 also been shown that dark sires saturated with Arabian blood 

 constantly beget progeny marked with stripes. It is therefore 

 not a matter for surprise if stripes occasionally appear on cart- 

 horses both in this country and on the Continent. 



32. We have seen that the colour of the horses of the 



1 This animal was examined by my friend Dr W. L. H. Duckworth, M.A., 

 Fellow of Jesus College, Cambridge, at the Cambridge Midsummer Fair, 1904. 



29—2 



