PREFACE. 



A periodical specially devoted to hippology com- 

 missioned me, a few years since, to give an account, from 

 an artistic point of view, of the pictures in recent 

 exhibitions, which had contained portrayals of horses. 

 Addressingthose who love horses and conscientious artists, 

 I had frequent occasion to deplore the carelessness with 

 which the reproduction of these animals was made, in 

 flagrant violation of the most elementary rules of their 

 locomotion, of the proportions within the limitations of 

 which they must live, as well as of the statistical know- 

 ledge, in the absence of which it is impossible to impart 

 animation to them. 



Having long since been impressed by this great gulf 

 in an instruction so useful for the exact reproduction of 

 the form and the accurate rendering of the motion, my 

 observations were concentrated upon the different breeds 

 of horses, more especially the Arab, which horse is 

 permitted to develop itself in the open air. Circum- 

 stances peculiarly favoured me, as I was compelled to 

 spend a number of the years of a very active existence 

 in the East, where one may be said to live on horseback. 



I spoke to the professors of l'Ecole des Beaux Arts, 

 and to various talented artists, of my project of publishing 

 under the form of advice, the information which was 

 fundamentally based upon a large number of comparative 

 mensurations made abroad. 



I will here insert two letters in response to the 

 explanation of my work, as well as to my observations 

 upon the study of the horse. 



