IVauabee Horses. io 



his horse to the gallop ; leaning very much forward, and clinging with his naked legs and heels 

 round the flanks, he comes past you at speed, his brown shanks bare up to the thigh, his stick 

 brandished in his hand, and his ragged robes flying behind ; then, checking the pace, he turns 

 right and left at a canter, pulls up, increases or diminishes his speed, and, with his bitless halter, 

 exhibits, if not the power of flinging his horse dead upon his haunches, possessed by the Turks and 

 other bit-using Orientals, at all events, much more control over the animal than an English 

 dragoon attains to with his heavy bit. On these occasions, it appeared to me that the halter 

 served to check, and the stick to guide; but I have seen the same feats performed when the 

 horseman was carrying the lance, and, consequently, was without his stick. Our purchases in 

 the desert amounted to one hundred horses; amongst all I saw tried, I never saw one attempt 

 to pull, or show the least want of docility. 



" Most horsemen will admit that this is an e.xtraordinary performance, and that none will 

 allow it more readily than those who are acquainted with the Arab horse as he appears in our 

 hands in India, where — so far as I may trust my own experience— he is hot, and inclined to 

 pull. Why should he display this failing with us, and not with his original masters.' My own 

 impression is that the secret lies in the different temper of the English and the Bedouin horseman. 

 The Bedouin (and every other race of Orientals that I am acquainted with seems to possess 

 somewhat of the same quality) exhibits a patience towards his horse as remarkable as the im- 

 patience and roughness of the Englishman. I am not inclined to put it to his credit in a moral 

 point of view; I do not believe that it results from affection for the animal, or from self-restraint ; 

 he is simply without the feeling of irritability which prompts the English horseman to acts of 

 biutality. In his mental organisation some screw is tight which in the English mind is loose; 

 he is sane on a point where the Englishman is slightly cracked ; and he rides on serene and con- 

 tented where the latter would go into a paroxysm of swearing and spurring. I have seen an Arab 

 stallion, broken loose at a moment when our camp was thronged with horses brought for sale, 

 turn the whole concern topsy-turvy, and reduce it to one tumult of pawing and snorting and 

 belligerent screeching ; and I never yet saw the captor, when he finally got hold of the halter, 

 show the least trace of anger, or do otherwise than lead the animal back to his pickets with 

 perfect calmness. Contrast this with the 'job' in the mouth, and the kick in the ribs, and the 

 curse that the English groom would bestow under similar circumstances, and you have, in a 

 great measure, the secret of the good temper of the Arab horse in Arab hands." 



WAIIABEE HORSES. 



In I1S56, Mr. William Giffard Palgrave, formerly an officer in the Indian army, published 

 an account of a journey through Central and Eastern Arabia, and his stay, disguised as an 

 Oriental, in the capital of the Wahabees, the most bigoted tribe of Mahomedans, from which 

 the following account of the purest race of Arabs is extracted. He describes a type which 

 has rarely if ever been seen in England ; — • 



" During this time I got a sight of the royal stables, an event much desired and eagerly 

 welcomed, for the Nejed horse is considered no less superior to all others of his kind in Arabia 

 than is the Arabian breed collectively to the Persian, Cape of Good Hope, or Indian. In Nejed 

 is the true birthplace of the Arab steed, the primal type, the authentic model — thus, at any rate, 

 I heard, and thus, so far at least as my experience goes, it appears to me, although I am aware 

 that distinguished authorities maintain another view ; but, at any rate, among all the studs of 

 Nejed, Feysul's was indisputably the first, and who sees that has seen the most consummate 

 specimens of eai'.'ne perfection in Arabia, perhaps in the world. It happened that a mare in 



