220 ALGERIAN HORSE 



Corps d'Armee is mounted on what may be called Arabian 

 horses, while numbers go to France. The corps has about 

 fifteen thousand such animals. Only stallions are used. 

 Mares out on the desert are kept for breeding ; within the 

 limits of civilization the few there are have been put to 

 work in the fields. One almost never sees a gelding. 



The Algerian horse may in every sense be highly com- 

 mended. He is docile from inherited kind treatment, is 

 readily broken, and is, as a rule, without tricks. He has the 

 kind eye and gentle manner of the Barb, a small but not 

 very bony head, a short, light, but round barrel and perfect 

 legs and feet. He is often leggy, but has good lung-power. 

 He has not quite enough body to suit my ideas. That 

 roundness which we all like behind the girths, and which 

 we consider essential to good qualities of endurance, does 

 not often exist. An old-fashioned horseman would say 

 that, to all appearances, he did not carry his feed well. 

 Perhaps he is not fed as much hay as our stock has to have 

 for mere warmth. He is neat-turned and averages good- 

 looking, but he does not carry an extra -high head, and 

 rarely carries a decent tail. They hog his mane not in- 

 frequently, a habit which is generally bred of Anglomania 

 among the French, though it is not unknown even among 

 the Bedouins of the desert. The drawing-book or lady's- 

 album Arabian one may go many a Sabbath-day's journey 

 to find and then fail to find him. There do exist Ara- 

 bians with the wonderful head, speaking eye, nervous 

 ear, teacup muzzle, delicate throttle, powerful shoulder, 

 wrought steel legs, high croup, and tail a poem ; but they 

 are very much like black pearls ; we know that there exist 

 such jewels, we occasionally see one in Tiffany's or on the 

 neck of some decolletee lady, but they are beyond our 

 reach. Two Arabians were sent over to General Grant as 

 a present. They were good specimens, but not the very 



