496 THE HORSE. 



(as the famous Toulouse of M. Cheradame of Eeouch^; and the 

 renowned Jean-le-Blane of M. Viard, of Villers, near Sap, in the 

 department of the Orne, etc., etc.,) placed alongside of an Arab, 

 presents, notwithstanding his heavier and grosser form, analogies 

 with him so striking that we are easily induced to believe them un- 

 doubted relations. The Percheron of the primitive type has a gray 

 coat like the Arab ; and like him, an abundant and silky mane, a 

 fine skin, and a large, prominent, and expressive eye ; a broad fore- 

 head, dilated nostrils and a full and deep chest, although the girth 

 with him as with the Arab, is always lacking in fulness ; more bony 

 and leaner limbs, and less covered with hair than those of the draft 

 horse families. He has not, it is true, the fine haunch and fine 

 form of the shoulder, nor that swan-like neck which distinguishes 

 the Arab ; but it is not to be forgotten that for ages he has been 

 employed for draft purposes, and these habits have imparted to 

 his bony frame an anatomical structure, a combination of levers 

 adapted to the work he is called upon to perform. He has not, 

 I again acknowledge, such a fine skin as the Arab, nor his 

 prettily rounded oval and small foot, but we must remember the 

 fact that he lives under a cold climate upon elevated plains, where 

 nature gives him for a covering a thicker and warmer coat, and 

 that he has for ages been stepping upon a moist, clayey s.oil. 



In all that remains in him, we recognise a heavy Arab, modified 

 and remodelled by climate and peculiar circumstances. He has 

 remained mild and laborious, like his sire; he is brought up like 

 him, in the midst of the family, and, like him, he possesses in a 

 very high degree the faculty of easy acclimation. He acquires 

 this in the midst of the numerous migrations he accomplishes in 

 Perche, the counterpart of those that the type horse makes upon 

 the sands of the desert. A final comparison, which, as yet, has 

 not been sufficiently noticed, is, that like the Arab, he has no 

 need of being mutilated in order to be trained, managed, and kept 

 without danger. In a word, the Percheron, notwithstanding the 

 ages which separate them, presents an affinity as close as possible 

 with the primitive horse, which is the Arab." 



Du Iluys mentions in support of his theory of the Arabian 

 origin of the Percheron, the historical fact of the defeat of the 

 Saracens near Tours, by Charles Martel, in the fourth century, 

 assuming the probability that many horses of the invaders, were 

 apportioned among the people of that section of France, and as the 

 males were entire, the eastern and native blood would naturally be 

 commingled in subsequent generations. 



He also says, " The Abb6 Fact, in a letter addressed to the 

 Congress of Mortagne, July 16th, 1843, and in his great work 

 upon La Perche, cites in this connection a Lord of Montdoubleau, 

 Geoffroy IV., and llotrou, Count of La Perche, as having brought 



