22 THE HORSE 



types could not be bred successfully in all parts 

 of the temperate zone where farming or stock- 

 raising could be engaged in at all. It is, of 

 course, easier to breed them where the soil is rich 

 and the pasturage abundant, but these accessories 

 are not indispensable. The Arabs have always 

 got along without them and their success, as breed- 

 ers can hardly be questioned. 



The development of different breeds from the 

 original type began almost with the dawn of his- 

 tory. The Greeks made much advance in the 

 science and it is evident, if only from the treatise 

 that has come down to us from Xenophon, that 

 their breed was a good one. The Roman horse, 

 notwithstanding the fact that the Romans owed 

 what they knew of horse-breeding — as, indeed, 

 the knowledge of all other arts and sciences — to 

 the Greeks, does not seem to have been as good. 

 He had good, clean limbs and head, but his body 

 was too thick and chunky. This defect doubtless 

 came from a mistaken idea on the part of his 

 breeders as to what constituted equine beauty and 

 grandeur, the wide chest and thick, arched neck 

 seeming to them to present a more imposing ap- 

 pearance than a finer and better type. 



Fortunately, we know just how the Roman 

 horse looked. The equestrian statue of Marcus 

 Aurelius, made by an unknown sculptor some sev- 



