4 HORSE-BREEDING FOR FARMERS CHAP. 
the history of these breeds to illustrate the science of 
breeding. ; 
Scientifically speaking, there is no such animal in 
existence as a thoroughbred horse. The term is 
only relative, and indicates that inbreeding and 
interbreeding have been restricted within certain 
limits during a number of generations. 
The mistaken idea is still prevalent in some 
quarters that the “pure” Arab horse is ¢e one 
thoroughbred horse, cast in the same mould as 
the first created one, retaining the same original 
qualities without deterioration or alteration, and the 
eternal prototype of the species ;—that as he was in 
the beginning, so he is and ever shall be,—or, as 
some French writers have described him, the “ natural 
horse” (cheval de la nature). No,—no one has yet 
discovered where the original ancestor of the horse 
lived, or what the equine father Adam was like. 
The cradle of the species may have been in 
Tartary, Siberia, or in America, but certainly not in 
Arabia. It is certain that the horse could not live 
in Arabia without the attention and care of man. 
Perhaps in no country is the horse more dependent 
on his owner for water and food. It is indisputable, 
however, that the Arab horse is the result of cultiva- 
tion of the inferior original type or types through 
thousands of years under favourable conditions. No 
one can doubt but that the Orientals had brought 
the horse to a degree of perfection long before his 
history was written. In the time of Mohammed, of 
course, he had reached a very high development, and 
hence the preference shown by the Prophet to him 
above all animals in creation. Ages before, he must 
