SAVAGE BACE-HOKSE8. 181 



CHAPTER V. 



SAVAGE JLACE-HOBSES. 



WE have very many vicious race-horses, some almost as 

 savage as tigers, more dangerous to approach than 

 Van Amburgh's lions, and certainly more so than Mr. 

 Smith's performing hippopotamus. But how comes our 

 racing sires to be so vicious ? It is probable that some 

 of their sires or grandsires may have been savages, and 

 that their naughty dispositions have been transmitted 

 to their progeny ; but go back to the great- grandsire or 

 dam, if you like, the question is still the same how 

 came they to be savage ? for horses are not naturally 

 savage. No ; the cause of their being savage, in the 

 first place, most assuredly originated with ourselves, 

 not with nature. There is an old saying, " The devil 

 is good tempered when he is pleased," which, I sup- 

 pose, means when nothing is done to or demanded of 

 him that is contrary to his inclinations. 



We all know that it requires considerable good sense 

 and command of temper, even in man, to avoid ill-hu- 

 mour or resistance when annoyed, even though he may 

 know that annoyance is unavoidable. How, then, I 

 would ask, can we expect an irrational animal like a 

 eolt to bear it without a strenuous, and, perhaps, violent 



