THE HORSE. 



heavy burdens, and to endure the coarsest drudgery, or endued with that just and 

 beautiful symmetry of form and delicacy of skin, which convey to the critical and 

 scientific view, ideas of perfection, and which are harbingers of the highest degree 

 of quadrupedal activity and speed. His full eye beams with mildness and gene- 

 rosity, or sparkles with the fire of courage, energy, and action. In war, he offers 

 a dauntless front to the greatest dangers, engaging in the mortal strife and clangor 

 of battle, unappalled, and as actuated by an undivided and equal interest with his 

 rider. In the field and on the course, he exhibits a speed, and power of con- 

 tinuance, a firmness of nerve, a strength of muscle and elasticity of sinew, of which 

 no other animal of the creation is capable ; bearing his rider along, over plains, 

 hills, and vallies, as if impelled by supernatural energy : but all descriptions of 

 the horse must give place to that inspired one of Job, which has elevated and 

 delighted the minds of men of all ages and all nations : 



" Hast thou given the Horse strength? Hast thou clothed his neck with 

 thunder? Canst thou make him afraid as a grasshopper? The glory of his 

 nostrils is terrible. He paweth in the valley, and rejoiceth in his strength. He 

 goeth on to meet the armed men. He mocketh at fear, and is not affrighted : 

 neither turneth he his back from the sword. The quiver rattleth against him, the 

 glittering spear, and the shield. He swalloweth the ground with fierceness and 

 rage : neither believeth he that it is the sound of the trumpet. He sayeth among 

 the trumpets, ha ! ha ! and he smelleth the battle afar off, the thunder of the cap- 

 tains, and the shouting." 



Job was a native of those desarts, to which is indigenous that fine and delicate 

 model of the horse genus, from his superior speed, styled the COURSER. These 

 beautiful animals are supposed to have originated in the desarts of Arabia, of Bar- 

 tary, and of some other parts of Africa, and from those to have migrated to the circum- 

 jacent countries. Granting this to be supposition, it is confirmed by an unbroken 

 evidence of facts during thousands of years, recourse being invariably had to those 

 desarts for supplies of this matchless race : but there exists no record of sufficient 

 antiquity to reach the first example of taming the horse, since the most ancient 

 histories represent him as already inured to the service of man. 



In order to have a clear understanding of the nature of this interesting animal, 

 it may be convenient to divide the genus (equus caballus) into two original species, 

 the most opposite indeed to each other, both in form and qualities, namely, the 

 Southern and the Northern, the fine courser of the Eastern desarts, and the gross, 

 coarse, and bulky horse of the lowlands of Europe. The former appears as he 

 came perfect from the hand of nature, independent of the art of man ; and his 

 activity and high spirit plainly destine him to the saddle, although in his native 

 regions, where the camel and the dromedary submit to the heavy burdens, he has 

 also been immemorially harnessed to the war chariot. The latter, a European 

 species, some of which are almost of elephantic size and weight, calculated chiefly 



