ANCESTRAL HORSES 83 



that in Professor Ewart's opinion it is the most 

 primitive of all the existing striped horses. 



There is no direct evidence that the ancestors of 

 horses were striped. Certain observers think that 

 some of the scratches on the life-like etchings on 

 bone, left us by our palaeolithic cave-dwelling ances- 

 tors, indicate such stripes; but little reliance can be 

 placed on this. On the other hand there is much 

 indirect evidence. Every one who has an eye for a 

 horse, and who has travelled in Norway, is sure to 

 have noticed the stripings, often quite conspicuous, 

 on the dun -coloured Norwegian ponies. Colonel 

 Poole assured Darwin that the Kathiawar horses had 

 frequently 'stripes on the cheeks and sides of the 

 nose.' Breeders are well aware that foals are often 

 born with stripes, usually on the shoulders or legs, 

 less frequently on the face. Such stripes as a rule 

 disappear as the colt grows up, but can often be de- 

 tected in later life for a short time after the coat has 

 been shed ; they are sometimes only visible in certain 

 lights, and then produce somewhat the same im- 

 pression as a watered silk. From the facts that more 

 or less striped horses are found all over the Old 

 World; that in Mexico and other parts of America 

 the descendants of horses which were introduced by 

 the Spaniards and which afterwards ran wild are 

 frequently dun-coloured and show stripes ; that foals 

 are frequently striped ; and that mules not un- 

 commonly have leg and shoulder stripes, the inference 

 is largely justified that the ancestors of all our horses 

 were striped. 



The hypothesis of reversion has recently been called 

 in question, and no doubt the term has been much 

 abused. Animals and plants have been said to revert 

 to some remote ancestor when they have varied in 

 some particular, and this variation has then been 

 described as a primitive character possessed by the 



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