HOKSE AMONG THE GERMANS. 



Well remembered, Frederick; but it was among the Ger- 

 mans that the horse was a particular favorite. Being essen- 

 tially a warlike people, devoted to the chase, and indifferent 

 to agricultural pursuits, it formed an important part of their 

 property. Superstition also had a great part in the value 

 which the Germans attached to their horses. They used to 

 sacrifice them, and they also employed them to predict the 

 future. Those which were consecrated to this latter use 

 were quite white, had never been used for labor, and were 

 fed in the sacred woods which served them as temples. On 

 stated occasions they were harnessed to a car appropriated to 

 that purpose, and also considered as sacred. The king, the 

 prince, or the priest of the people accompanied them and pre- 

 dicted the future by their neighings. 



FREDERICK. 



It was by the neighing of his horse that Darius (father of 

 Xerxes) gained the throne of Persia. 



MRS. F. 



True; but to return to the Germans: their laws prove the 

 value that they set upon their horses; the fine for stealing one 

 being forty-five pence, while it was only thirty-five for steal- 

 ing a slave. A man, after he was unable to carry arms and 

 ride on horseback, was considered to be no longer fit to live, 

 and was incapacitated from disposing of his property. The 

 gigantic horse cut out of the chalk bank, which still exists in 

 the south-west of the hill, near Edrington, in Berkshire, and 

 which occupies an acre of ground, and may be seen in some 

 points at a distance of twelve miles, is supposed to have been 

 cut at some later period in commemoration of the victory 

 gained there by Alfred over the Danes.* 



ESTHER. 



Did not the chiefs often take the name of a horse? Horsa 

 for instance? 



* Wheatman's History of the Northmen. 



