32 THE HORSE. 



weary march; at length,. eighty years old, and unable 

 - longer to ride her, he gave her, and a scimitar that had 

 been his father's, to his eldest son, and told him to appre- 

 ciate their value, and never lie down to rest until he had 

 rubbed them both as bright as a looking-glass. In the 

 first skirmish in which the young man was engaged, he 

 was killed, and the mare fell into the hands of the enemy. 

 When the news reached the old man, he exclaimed " that 

 life was no longer worth preserving, for that he had lost 

 both his son and his mare, and he grieved for one as much 

 as the other ;" and he immediately sickened and died. 



The following anecdote of the attachment of an Arab to 

 his mare has often been told, but it comes home to the bo- 

 som of every on.e possessed of common feeling. "The 

 whole stock of an Arab of the desert consisted of a mare. 

 The French consul offered to purchase her in order to 

 send her to his sovereign, Louis XIV. The Arab would 

 have rejected the proposal at once with indignation and 

 scorn ; but he was miserably poor. He had no means of 

 supplying his most urgent wants, or procuring the barest 

 necessaries of life. Still he hesitated; he had scarcely a 

 rag to cover him and his wife and his children were 

 starving. The sum offered was great it would provide 

 him and his family with food for life. At length, and re- 

 luctantly, he consented. He brought the mare to the 

 dwelling of the consul he dismounted he stood leaning 

 upon her ; he looked now at the gold, and then at his fa- 

 vorite ; he sighed, he wept. " To whom is it," said he, 

 " I am going to yield thee up ? To Europeans, who will tie 

 thee close who will beat thee who will render thee mise- 

 rable. Return with me, my beauty, my jewel, and re- 

 joice the hearts of my children." As he pronounced the 

 last words, he sprung upon her back, and was out of sight 

 in a moment. 



The next anecdote is scarcely less touching, and not so 

 well known. Ibrahim, a poor but worthy Arab, unable to 



