460 FROM NORTH POLE TO EQUATOR. 



Persians, English and Germans, but he does constantly endeavour 

 to secure the improvement of his favourite breeds by only placing 

 the best stallions with the mares, and castrating the rest. Un- 

 fortunately his choice of breeding -horses is determined solely 

 by form, and does not take colour into consideration at all, the 

 consequence being that many of his horses are exceedingly ugly, 

 because their colouring is so irregular and unequal. The training of 

 the horse leaves much to be desired; our wandering herdsman is 

 much too rich in horses for this to be otherwise. 



We found the Kirghiz horse a pleasant and good-natured crea- 

 ture, although it by no means fulfilled our ideal of beauty in all 

 respects. It is of medium size and slender build, with a head not 

 ugly though rather large, decidedly ram-nosed, and noticeably 

 thickened by the prominent lower jaw-bones, a moderately long 

 and powerful neck, a long body, fine limbs, and soft hair. Its eyes 

 are large and fiery, its ears somewhat large, but well-shaped. Mane 

 and tail have fine, long hair, always abundant, the hair of the tail 

 growing so luxuriantly that it sweeps the ground; the legs are well 

 formed, but rather slim, the hoofs are upright, but often rather 

 too high. Light colours prevail and very ugly piebalds often offend 

 the eye. The commonest colours are brown, light -brown, fox- 

 coloured, dun, and bay, more rare are dark-brown and black, and 

 one only occasionally sees a gray. The mane and tail greatly 

 increase the beauty of all the light-coloured horses, because they 

 are either black or much lighter than the body hairs. 



The temper of the animal is worthy of all praise. The Kirghiz 

 horse is fiery, yet extremely good-natured, courageous in the 

 presence of all known dangers, and only nervous, skittish, and 

 timid when it is bewildered for a moment by something unusual; 

 it is spirited and eager in its work, obedient, docile, willing, ener- 

 getic, and very enduring, but it is chiefly valuable for riding, and 

 requires long breaking-in to make it of use as a draught animal, in 

 which capacity it is much less valuable than as a riding-horse. 



It has a particularly disagreeable habit, for which the Kirghiz is 

 certainly more to blame than the animal, of constantly eating or at 

 least nibbling on the way; it even attempts to satisfy its appetite in 



