lOO DOMESTICATED ANIMALS 



their weight ; they quickly broke down the columns which 

 supported the roof, so that the whole structure at once 

 became a heap of wood and mules. The unhappy proprietor 

 of the drove, in his consternation, forgot even to swear — an 

 art which I have never known on any other occasion to pass 

 from a mule-driver ; and, sitting on his white horse, he lifted 

 his hands like an oriental in prayer, and said to me meekly, 

 " Did you ever in all your life ? " I assured him that I had 

 never, and went my way, leaving him to settle an interesting 

 case of damages with the owner of the mansion. 



In considering the general influence of the horse and its 

 kindred forms on human culture, we clearly perceive that we 

 are now attaining a time when the machinery of civilization 

 is to depend in a much less degree than of old on the help 

 which these creatures give to man. Even fifty years ago 

 the horse was far more necessary to the work of our kind 

 than it is at present. Going back a hundred years, we 

 perceive that the population of the civilized world could not 

 possibly have been maintained, if by some disease all the 

 horses had been swept away. Such a calamity in the year 

 1800 would have led to the depopulation of almost all the 

 cities of the interior country, famine would have ravaged 

 our States, and the whole economic system of society would 

 have had to be reconstructed. Now the greater part of the 

 work which of old had to be done by horses, can, at a slight 

 increase of cost, be effected by mechanical engines. Plough- 

 ing, except on steep hillsides and in very stony ground, can 

 be cheaply and effectively done by steam. The same agent 

 can propel the harvesters and work the threshing machines. 

 Even farmers who till fields of no great extent find it 

 desirable to do much of their work by steam-engines, for 



