IV] THE ORIGIN OF THE LIBYAN HORSE 469 



Again, although ergots (fetlock callosities) are generally 

 present in all domestic horses, Prof. Ewart has shown that 

 they are frequently absent in Icelandic and occasionally in 

 Hebridean and Connemara ponies, whilst Captain Hayes^ has 

 " noticed their frequent absence in pure-bred Arab horses and 

 in thoroughbreds." The same great authority observes that 

 "the nearer a horse approaches the heavy draught type, the 

 thicker is the growth of the callosities on his legs." In view of 

 the complete absence of hock callosities and also of ergots in 

 many horses of the same race, and the fact that such callosities 

 seem universal in Prejvalsky's horse and the Mongolian pony, 

 and that the more nearly a horse approaches the coarse type, 

 the larger are such callosities, and the nearer he approaches 

 the Libyan and Celtic types (in which they are sometimes 

 completely absent), the smaller they become, the evidence 

 indicates that E. c. lihyciis either had completely discarded or 

 had a general tendency to get rid of both hock and fetlock 

 callosities. 



In the Libyan horse and its derivatives — the Arab, the 

 Andalusian, and the English thoroughbred — the tail is different 

 in structure, in its covering and in the manner in which it is 

 carried (Figs. 58, 68, 73, 75) from that of the Prejvalsky's horse 

 and the Mongolian pony (Figs. 18, 53). Yet this is no more a 

 mere outcome of artificial breeding since the Christian era than 

 is the bay colour and the star in the forehead, for we have 

 found the same feature in the horses driven by Seti I (p. 217), 

 in those under Cypriote chariots on vases dating from 1000 B.C. 

 (p. 288) and in those ridden by Libyans (p. 243) pourtrayed on 

 the pottery found at Daphnae and dating from 600 B.C. Look 

 at the well-bred Sicilian horse on the coins of Panormus (p. 255). 

 The animal carries his tail in the characteristic fashion that 

 we associate with Arabs, Barbs, and thoroughbreds. 



We have already seen (p. 143) that since my paper appeared 

 Mr Lydekker, in view of the facts that Hipparion had a deep 

 pre-orbital pit for a gland, that E. sivaUnsis, an Indian fossil 

 horse, had a rudimentary pre-orbital pit, and that he himself 



» The Points of the Horse, pp. 319-20. 



