

HISTORY. 473 



sports of the Circus. They were mixed largely in blood with 

 the horses of Sicily and Spain ; and, in a subsequent age, they 

 contributed to give its peculiar characters to the race-horse 

 of England. The finest of the Barbary horses have been de- 

 rived from the countries of the coasts of Fez, Morocco, and 

 Tripoli. Those of the interior, on the confines of the Great 

 Desert, are described as of a smaller size, but as being swift, 

 and wonderfully patient of thirst, hunger, and toil. Some of 

 them in the inland mountains of Morocco are said to be of 

 matchless endurance, to be swift, swallowers of the wind, as 

 they are termed, but to droop and die when brought to the 

 countries on the sea, and deprived of their habitual aliment. 

 Turning from the regions of the swift and agile Horse of 

 Africa to the countries of the Euxine and Caspian Seas, we 

 find the animal reared under different conditions, and exhi- 

 biting a different class of characters. He is here of a robuster 

 form, with broader chest and more muscular limbs. He is 

 superior in strength of body to the slender African, but infe- 

 rior in speed. His bearing is more bold, his aspect more 

 noble. He is capable of tasks to which the strength of the 

 African is unsuited ; but he requires a larger supply of food, 

 and would sink under the thirst and slender nourishment on 

 which the other can subsist. This race is found in perfec- 

 tion in the countries near the Caucasus, in Armenia, and 

 other parts of Asia Minor. The Circassians, amongst the 

 western Asiatics, are noted for the beauty and excellence of 

 their horses. These warlike mountaineers have their breeds 

 of noble blood, on which they set an extreme value. They 

 brand them by peculiar marks, as a horse-shoe, an arrow, a 

 lance, the imitation of which they punish as a capital crime. 

 The Turcomans possess horses of great strength and power, 

 fit for war and the chase ; and likewise the Kurds, who have 

 in every age maintained their liberties. It is from the same 

 countries that the Turks derived that splendid cavalry with 

 which they subdued the neighbouring nations. Recurring to 

 the happier ages when Asia Minor was covered with cities 



