426 THE COUNTRY HORSE 



one could perceive no evidence of any saddle quality. In 

 the mountains his Highness rides his Burmese ponies. I 

 did not see any of the horses led out, and a horse in the 

 stall is rather a deceptive thing to look at. They may 

 have been better than they appeared. 



The little country horse which you see drawing the na- 

 tive springless cart, or used for a pack, or ridden, is usual- 

 ly the meanest kind of a runt imaginable, whose ancestry, 

 hard- worked, badly fed, and never cared for, has transmit- 

 ted to him crooked legs and an ill-shapen body — I am not 

 sure that I have ever seen a worse. But he is scarcely in 

 our line, for he could by no means be twisted into the 

 semblance of a saddle- beast. 



