HUNGARIAN TROOPERS 389 



palace in Pera; here he labors with honest fidelity to 

 effect the impossible ; for the bad Turkish customs are 

 like the laws of the Medes and Persians. The system is 

 as rotten as the people are hard to teach. Moreover, the 

 Sultan is the simplest and most unrequiring man in his 

 dominions. The unpretentious courtesy of his personal 

 bearing, his apparent lack of egotism, his rather pale, nerv- 

 ous, overworked face are dignity itself. I have never 

 witnessed a more patriarchal ceremony, or one of higher 

 tone than this quiet procession of Selamlik. 



To come back to the horses, I could not recognize in 

 many of those I there saw the characteristics of desert 

 blood; I suspected the truth, and was, on inquiry, told 

 that they were largely imported or of imported stock. 



The Arabian is not considered heavy enough for the 

 Turkish cavalry in Europe ; a Hungarian horse is bought 

 or bred for the army, and, to a considerable extent, crossed 

 with Arabian blood. It seems most natural to use the 

 Arabian as the sire ; but the experiment, I was told, is 

 being tried of putting Arabian mares (where they man- 

 age to get any but scrubs I do not know) to the stallion 

 from Hungary, the latter being largely impregnated by 

 the English thorough-bred. This horse is for the man. 

 Many of the officers in Turkey all swells have military 

 rank import well-bred ones from various countries ; and 

 though you see a number of typical and very beautiful 

 Arabians, especially in the Sultan's stud, you are out of 

 the domain of the unalloyed article. And as to general 

 grading, one may any day see a lot of saddle-beasts rid- 

 den in and out of our Southern towns, which in every 

 saddle quality are superior to what I saw at Selamlik. 

 The horses would not be splendidly caparisoned, nor the 

 riders gorgeously clad, but the style and gait and blood 

 would tell the story. The New York Horse Show is not 



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