THE MUSTANG, OR WILD HORSE. 471 
But the point I wish particularly to direct the attention 
of our breeders to. is the importance of crossing the mares 
upon our big-boned American stock. A great many facts 
have come under my observation which would prove this to 
be an exceedingly interesting field of inquiry. The experi- 
ment has already been tried upon the western frontier of 
Texas, and it is perfectly astonishing what a splendid animal 
‘is produced by the cross of even a very coarse American 
stud, so he has size, upon these high-blooded and fiery little 
mares. A single cross makes the best saddle horse, take 
him altogether, I have ever met with, and we have some 
pretty passible hacks in Kentucky! It could hardly well be 
otherwise, when we look at the pure descent of these mares ! 
Yet apart from these considerations of utility, if a herd 
of buffalo be the grandest and most formidable of our prairie 
sights, certainly a drove of mustangs must be accounted the 
most magnificently beautiful. No imagination can compass 
the exceeding grace and airy freedom of the arched and 
silken-tossing chaos, as it sways to and fro, glistening in 
‘beamy mail beneath the sun, while sportively unconscious of 
observation. How grandly they plunge, curvette and wrestle, 
wheel like trained columns, charge, scatter and form again 
in the swift change of magic convolutions, shifting like cloud 
’ shadows eddied on an April breeze along the grass, as swift, 
if not as fleeting ! 
So they appear from the distance, at which they can alone 
be viewed, as in our sketch. Sometimes I have come upon 
them suddenly amidst the motts of timber; when the mo- 
mentary, but nearer view, would disclose the muttled variety 
of their coats to which I have referred; but most usually 
they are seen in swift battalions, scurrying across the plains, 
and stopping for-a moment, on the last undulation, for a 
parting look at the intruder, cluster with flying hair against 
the sky, and are gone! 
