254 STUDIES IN THE EVOLUTION OF ANIMALS 



Natural History Museum, the cannon bones of which have no 

 trace of suture. Professor Marsh, who has devoted much attention 

 to recent polydactyle Horses, gives a figure of the horned Horse of 

 Texas. 1 That this particular polydactyle Horse was also horned may 

 be of some importance in comparing the limbs of Horses and Oxen. 



Professor Marsh mentions that Julius Caesar 'used to ride a 

 remarkable Horse, which had feet that were almost human, the 

 hoofs being cleft like toes.' He gives several cases of additional 

 digits in the Horse, besides the usual one big digit. But none of 

 these seem to be of the nature of the Cow-foot of Chauveau and 

 M'Fadyean. 



The size of a digit would naturally depend to a large extent on 

 the fact of the weight of the body being thrown principally on that 

 particular digit. In the Tapir, Rhinoceros, and Elephant, it was 

 thrown on the third ; in the Horse, if uneven-toed, also on the 

 third, but if even-toed, like the ruminants, the weight was thrown 

 equally on the third and fourth. In man it is thrown on the first 

 of the foot. 2 In Chczropus Castanotis^ a marsupial, we have in the 

 hand the third digit largest, while in the foot the fourth is largest 

 and the rest more or less atrophied. 



It must not be supposed that a two-digited Ox cannot run as 

 quickly as a one-digited Horse. When in Kandy (Ceylon), I one 

 day hired a wagonette with one large Horse to take me to Pera- 

 denya. The Horse trotted all the way. Behind us was a small 

 Zebu Ox harnessed to a native cart. It trotted all the way, and 

 always kept the same distance behind us. Rich natives in India 

 keep large Hansi Oxen, which are very good trotters. I should 

 say there are not many Horses that can gallop as fast as an 



1 American Journal of Science, third series, vol. 43, 1892, p. 344. 



2 Some men wear the heels of their boots on the outer side, which means that they 

 walk somewhat like a Gorilla, and throw their weight on the otilside of their feet, and 

 therefore on the smallest of their toes. 



