Another very amusing blunder of these notorious tribunals is 

 instanced by Col. Bower : ' ' two horses in a certain batch were con- 

 denmed as 'mad', spavined in both hocks and absolutely unfit;" 

 these very two horses turned out to be, after the effects of their 

 voyage had been overcome and their bruises healed, "the famous 

 Sir Benjamin and Battledore with whose performance all India be- 

 came familiar. ' ' 



Let us listen to just one more authority on a question which at 

 the same time shows to what kind of material the Cape remount 

 was forced to give way and to realize all the better what South 

 Africa has lost by her neglect of so efficient an animal. 



"Sir Walter Gilbey states on the authority of General Wheeler 

 and others who had the opportunity of appreciating the evils of 

 warfare in having guns horsed with brutes that could not be de- 

 pended upon. "Even the best of them (the Indian stud breeds and 

 Australian Walers) are often too bad tempered and of insufficient 

 substance that v/hen they meet with any obstacle they cannot im- 

 mediately surmount, they become sulky and will not renew the 

 effort ***** in short had an annual draught of 500 horses from 

 the Cape been established six years ago, as might have been done, 

 great would by this time have been the saving of public money ; for 

 to whatever presidency the Cape horses would have been alloted, 

 efficiency vrould have been proportionately improved especially in 

 Bengal by getting rid of some of the rubbish. ****** They 

 were as bad in the Afghan war when "no description of horses in 

 the artillery of Sir John Keene's army so disgraced himself in the 

 ranks as that on which the Indian Government studs have expended 

 so much money to produce. The horses of these studs have been 

 proved beyond all comparison, the most worthless garrons with 

 which the public service has ever been encumbered. ' ""^ 



When the Crimean War broke out in 1854 several of the Cape- 

 horsed Cavalry regiments were ordered to the front and the Cape 

 horses acquitted themselves admirably in that most trying cam- 

 paign. "Captain Wilder marched from Suez to Cairo and landed 

 in the Crimea with the 10th. Huzzars mounted on Cape horses 

 that must have been from fifteen to sixteen years old at least, yet 

 they gave the highest satisfaction."^^ 



(86) Montgomery Martin, Bacing Calendar 1S85. 



(87) Papers relating to the purchase of horses for cavalry service in India. 



BluelooTcs 1875. 



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