ABABIAN HOESE.] 



THE HORSE, AND 



'AKABIAN HOESE. 



case, he remains incapable of advancing a step 

 till the horseman's return, or his companions, 

 coming up, pierce him through with javelins 

 and lances ; he then falls to the ground, and 

 expires with loss of blood. 



"The agageer nearest me presently lamed 

 his elephant, and left him standing. Ayto 

 Engedan, Ayto Confu, Guebra Marram, and 

 several others, fixed their spears in the other 

 before the agageer had cut his tendons. INIy 

 agageer, however, having wounded the first 

 efephant, failed in the pursuit of the second ; 

 and being close upon him at the entrance of 

 the wood, he received a violent blow from the 

 branch of a tree which the elephant had bent 

 by his weight, and, after passing, allowed it 

 to replace itself, when it knocked down both 

 the riders, and very much hurt the horse. 

 This, indeed, is the great danger in elephant- 

 hunting ; for some of the trees, that are dry 

 and short, break by the violent pressure of so 

 immense a body moving so rapidly, and fall 

 upon the pursuers, or across the road. But 

 the greatest number of these trees bend with- 

 out breaking, and return quickly to the former 

 position, when they strike both horse and 

 man so violently, that they often beat them to 

 pieces." 



THE ARABIAN HORSE. 



Arabia has been considered, by some natu- 

 ralists, the original country of the horse, but 

 upon what grounds it is not so easy to deter- 

 mine. It has already been shown that Solo- 

 mon received all hia own horses from Egypt ; 

 and those which he sent to the sovereigns of 

 Phoenicia, he also procured from that country. 

 Even so late as the second century of the Chris- 

 tian era, there is a record extant, showing that 

 horses were among the articles exported from 

 Egypt to Arabia ; and, in the seventh century, 

 when Mahomet attacked Koreish, near Mecca, 

 be had no more than two horses in his whole 

 army. Such circumstances speak strongly 

 against the assertion that the horse is origi- 

 nally Arabian ; for if he were so, it is difficult 

 to account for his scarcity in a country which, 

 of all others, ought to have been the most 



• In Medjed the horse is said to feed regularly on 

 <lates ; and it has been asserted, that even boiled and raw 

 flesh are given to them by some of their more wealthy 

 proprietors. Very little water, however, is allowed 



natural for his rapid propagation. At what 

 time the Arabs began to employ him is not 

 very clear. At all events, from the facts just 

 given, it must have been at a comparatively 

 late era. "Where they obtained their breed, it 

 is likewise impossible accurately to deter- 

 mine. In our opinion, Arabia is more likely to 

 have been supplied from the Egyptian stock, 

 rather than from that of any other land ; for 

 if, in the days of Solomon, the Arabian horses 

 had been distinguished, that monarch would 

 have supplied his stables with, at least, a few of 

 them, for the mere purposes of display, if for 

 nothing else. Taking into account tlie phy- 

 sical features of Arabia, we should think it is 

 not very favourable for rapidly increasing the 

 breed of horses. Designated, in its three 

 great geographical divisions, as the Stony, 

 the Desert, and the Happy, it has been com- 

 pared to a coarse garment with a rich border. 

 In its centre it presents nothing more than a 

 dreary plain of sand, alike destitute of water 

 and vegetation — marked only by the tracks of 

 caravans. A chain of mountains runs along 

 the west to the Arabian Sea on the south ; but 

 it has no river of a magnitude sufficient to 

 make it important. The few streams which 

 wander over the country are generally absorbed 

 by the sandy tracts they pervade, and decrease in 

 volume during their progress to the sea. The 

 mountains are few, and its climate is sultry. 

 Vegetables of every description are scarce. 

 The cofi'ee shrub, planted on terraces in the 

 form of an amphitheatre, grows to perfection ; 

 and the date, the tamarind, and the orange, 

 also flourish : but horses neither drink cofi'ee, 

 nor eat tamarinds or oranges ;* and hence are 

 more likely to have had their origin in a 

 country much better adapted by nature to 

 their wants than Arabia seems to be. Burc- 

 hardt says that the tribes richest in horses, 

 are those who dwell, during the spring of the 

 year at least, in the fertile plains of Meso- 

 potamia ; for, notwithstanding all that is said 

 of the desert horse, plenty of nutritious food 

 is absolutely requisite for its reaching its full 

 vigour and growth. The numerous tribes in 

 the Eed Sea, between Akaba and Mecca, 



them, the Arabs thinking that much liquid affects 

 the wind, as well as mars the proportions of their 

 favourite animal, and ••enders him less beautiful to look 

 upon. 



