Chap. II. THEIR VARIATION. 51 



since the earliest known records. 9 Even in so fleeting a cha- 

 racter as colour, Hofacker 10 found that, out of two hundred and 

 sixteen cases in which horses of the same colour were paired, 

 only eleven pairs produced foals of a quite different colour. 

 As Professor Low 11 has remarked, the English race-horse offers 

 the best possible evidence of inheritance. The pedigree of a 

 race-horse is of more value in judging of its probable success 

 than its appearance: "King Herod" gained in prizes 201,505?. 

 sterling, and begot 497 winners ; " Eclipse " begot 334 winners. 

 Whether the whole amount of difference between the various 

 breeds be due to variation is doubtful. From the fertility of the 

 most distinct breeds 12 when crossed, naturalists have generally 

 looked at all the breeds as having descended from a single species. 

 Few will agree with Colonel H. Smith, who believes that they 

 have descended from no less than five primitive and differently 

 coloured stocks. 13 But as several species and varieties of the 

 horse existed 14 during the latter tertiary periods, and as 

 Riitimeyer found differences in the size and form of the skull 

 in the earliest known domesticated horses, 15 we ought not to feel 

 sure that all our breeds have descended from a single species. 

 As we see that the savages of North and South America easily 

 reclaim the feral horses, there is no improbability in savages in 

 various quarters of the world having domesticated more than one 

 native species or natural race. No aboriginal or truly wild horse 

 is positively known now to exist ; for it is thought by some 

 authors that the wild horses of the East are escaped domestic 

 animals. 16 If our domestic breeds have descended from several 



9 Godron, 'Del'Espece,' torn. i.p. 378. Norwegian pony: see A. Walker on 



10 ' Ueber die Eigenschaften,' &c, ' Intermarriage,' 1838, p. 205. 



1828, s. 10. is 'Naturalist's Library,' Horses, vol. 



11 ' Domesticated Animals of the xii. p. 208. 



British Islands,' pp. 527, 532. In all M Gervais, 'Hist. Nat. Mamm.,' torn, 



the veterinary treatises and papers ii. p. 143. Owen, • British Fossil Mam- 



which I have read, the writers insist mals,' p. 383. 



in the strongest terms on the inheritance 15 < Kenntniss der fossilen Pferde,' 



by the horse of all good and bad 1863, s 131 



tendencies and qualities. Perhaps the « ' Mr. W. O. L. Martin (< The Horse,' 



prmcipte of inheritance is not really 1845, p. 34), in arguing against the belief 



stronger in the horse than in any other that the wild Eastern horses are merely 



animal; but, from its value, the ten- feral, has remarked on the improbability 



dency has been more carefully observed. of man in ancient times having extir- 



Andrew Knight crossed breeds so pated a species in a region where it can 



different in size as a dray-horse and now exist in numbers 



E 2 



