Natural Hijiory of the Ancients. 123 



inftance of the ufe to which its teeth might be put 

 may be feen in the Gibbs's bequeft at the South 

 Kenfington Mufeum, where a fet of forty-three 

 draught-men occurs, which date from Anglo-Saxon 

 times. Turning to the fatherland of thefe Teutonic 

 invaders, it is impomble to forget Odin's celebrated 

 eight-footed horfe, Sleipnir. The horfe was much 

 offered in facrifice, and alfo eaten among the 

 northern nations, before the introduction of Chrif- 

 tianity, and there are many indications that the 

 early converts could not wholly give up the eating 

 of horfe-flefh. The ancient Germans, after the 

 facrifice of horfes, commonly cut off their heads, 

 and fixed them in fome facred grove as acceptable 

 offerings to their gods. 



At the New Year's feftival horfes were fpecially 

 facrificed. We have feen in the more retired dif- 

 tricls of Glamorganfhire the head of a horfe carried 

 round the country at Chriftmas-time with ringing 

 and merriment, which is without doubt a relic of 

 thefe heathenifh fuperftitions. Pope Gregory III. 

 wrote to St. Boniface fo late as A.D. 751, "Among 

 other things, you add that fome are wont to eat 

 wild horfes, and very many domeftic horfes : this 

 you mould never fuffer to be done. Some fowls 

 alfo, fuch as jackdaws, rooks, and ftorks, are to be 

 wholly interdicted from the meals of Chriftians; 

 beavers alfo, and hares, and much more wild horfes, 

 are to be avoided." 1 Horfe-flefh and that of cats 



1 " Inter cetera agreftem caballum aliquantos comedere 

 adjunxifti, plerofque et domefticum ; hoc nequaquam fieri 

 deinceps finas. Imprimis de volatilibus, id eft graculis et 



