INTERESTING FEATURES IN HORSES, ETC. 



169 



I have seen a Horse with a blackish star on a white blaze, and 

 others, mostly bays, with a white star on a black blaze. This 

 shows that although usually the star is white, it may, under certain 

 circumstances, be exchanged for a black one ; and although 

 usually the blaze is white, it sometimes can also be black. I have 

 seen a perfect black blaze on the face of a light dun Horse. It was 

 as full as the complete white blaze of («) Fig. 74. 



These features in the domestic Horse are so persistent, even 

 when all other spotting from the body has wholly disappeared, that 



Fig. 75. — [a] Faint radiating stripes on the foreliead of a dark grey Horse ; [b] blaclc radiat- 

 ing stripes on the forehead of Burchell's Zebra — note its lozenge-shaped face. 



they would seem to have some deeper meaning than mere 

 accidental marks. It is interesting to note that even the Zebra 

 may have a small black star on its forehead between the eyes, as 

 seen in Fig. 50. 



The persistence of these features may be because domestic 

 Horses have been bred originally from parents that had them. 

 Breeders of first-class Horses, I understand, would rather not have 

 either stars or blazes, and it may be presumed that they have 



