Prevalence of Roaring. 27 



but in no case have I found the stock from such animals 

 give the slightest sign of such an affection.' And yet 

 Strangles is common, and frequently prevails in a wide- 

 spread and severe form. 



But if the native horses are rarely affected with Roaring 

 in South Africa, it would appear that newly-imported ones 

 are sometimes very liable to it — especially those from 

 England. A striking instance of this was afforded in 1879, 

 during and subsequent to the Zulu War, among the army 

 horses sent from England. Inspecting Veterinary Surgeon 

 Lambert, who was then attached to the I7th Lancers during 

 the campaign, gives me the following particulars : 



That regiment left England in February, and arrived in 

 Durban in April, 1879, with more than three hundred 

 Irish mares, and some scores of geldings. At the conclu- 

 sion of the war, when the regiment returned from Zululand 

 to Natal, towards the end of the year, the horses were sold 

 by auction, and eagerly bought by the Boer and other 

 farmers ; the mares especially were in great demand for 

 breeding purposes, as the South African horse has much 

 degenerated in size and general physique during the last 

 thirty years, and the I7th Lancers' mares were large and 

 good of their kind. Mr. Lambert went again to Natal in 

 1881, in the capacity of Principal Veterinary Surgeon of the 

 Expeditionary Force sent against the Boers, and there he 

 made many inquiries as to how the I7th Lancers' mares 

 had turned out. The answer always was, that they had 

 proved barren and become Roarers. Mr. Lambert himself 

 took out a fine horse as a charger, and within three months 

 after landing in Natal the animal was a bad Roarer. An 

 excellent hunting and steeplechase mare, which an officer 

 of the I7th Lancers took out in 1879, and sold in Natal, 

 Mr. Lambert saw in a cab at Pietermaritzburg in 1881, she 

 having become a Roarer, besides proving barren. Colonel 

 Gore, commanding the Inniskilling Dragoons, took out to 

 Natal, in 1881, two excellent young horses bred by himself, 



