DOMESTIC ANIMALS 115 



horse, does not regularly breed in captivity. The domesti- 

 cated stock has to be kept up by animals caught from the 

 wild herds. Is it not strange that these enormous brutes 

 will very soon obey the word and beckon of their masters, 

 who have absolutely no physical control over them ? 



There is no doubt that horses were at first domesticated 

 for the meat they furnished. The ancient Germans, Anglo- 

 Saxons, and Scandinavians sacrificed horses to their gods 

 and were fond of horseflesh ; the value of horses as draft and 

 saddle animals they learned later. In many large European 

 cities, where meat is very high in price, several shops pub- 

 licly sell horse meat and horse sausages, and they have a 

 considerable trade, but mostly among poor people. The 

 Greek heroes of Homer did not ride to battle on horseback. 

 Horses were employed only to draw their war chariots ; in 

 agriculture, the Greeks of that time used oxen. 



In modern times the horse has nearly supplanted the ox 

 as a draft animal, and completely supplanted it as a saddle 

 animal. 



However, within the last twenty-five years a peculiar 

 revolution has been going on. The noble horse himself is 

 being supplanted by steam and electricity. Not more than ten 

 years ago our large cities employed thousands of horses in 

 their street-car systems; to-day there is not a single horse- 

 car in several of them. The result is that horses are very 

 cheap. But in spite of this revolution it seems that farmers, 

 the world over, will always have need of a large number of 

 horses. 



The horse in war. The horse has probably been the most 

 important factor in the aggressive and victorious march of 

 the Aryan race to the conquest of the world. The armed 

 European horseman struck terror into the hearts of the 

 bravest Mexican and Peruvian soldiers, and to-day the horse- 

 less American natives have either vanished or dwindled 



