86 UNRELIABLE EVIDENCE 



rides are concerned, I have been unable to pin down a 

 single such ride to reliable evidence. An Arab sheik out 

 in the desert, who owns a high-bred mare, will tell you of 

 marvellous performances, but they are as nebulous as his 

 own Thousand and One Nights. I once sought to pur- 

 chase some speed a drive of eighty miles over the excel- 

 lent turnpike from Soussa to Tunis in order to catch a 

 steamer ; but though the owner of some really fine Ara- 

 bians had been telling about the three hundred kilometres 

 (one hundred and eighty-six miles) a day they could do, 

 no amount of money could induce him to agree to take 

 me over the course of eighty miles with four horses and 

 a light vehicle in less than twenty hours. 



It used to be asserted that the Turcoman cavalry could 

 ride in large bodies one hundred miles a day for a week, 

 or even more ; but, though all the steppes horses of the 

 world, like our broncos, are incomparable stayers on their 

 own terrain, this distance must be cut down by a large 

 percentage. My ancient school - friend, now a pacha, 

 major-general, and chief of the forty thousand odd Kurd- 

 ish cavalry of the Turkish Empire, though absolutely 

 familiar with the subject, was unwilling to vouch for 

 such a statement. The Kurdish is practically the same 

 as the Turcoman horse. In talking it over, this gentle- 

 man cited one of his own distance rides, fifteen hundred 

 kilometres in forty -five days, as a great performance, 

 which he thought established the reputation of the horse 

 of Asia Minor beyond cavil. But this is only thirty-three 

 miles a day. It was unnecessary to argue the matter, as 

 it would not have elicited more accurate statistics. 



After all said, the palm for distance riding must be 

 awarded to our own cavalry officers. Taking all the con- 

 ditions into account, there are probably no civilized horse- 

 men who can ride so far with a body of men and bring 



