EVOLUTION OF THE HORSE 7 



continental glaciers covered the northern parts of Europe and 

 North America, and the Recent Epoch, of more moderate climate 



during which civilization has arisen. 



In the early part of the Quaternary Period, wild specii 

 Horse were to be found on every continent except Australia. 



Remains of these true native horses have hern found buried in 

 strata ^i this age in all parts of the United States, in Alaska, in 



Mexico, in Ecuador, Brazil and Argentina, as well as in Europe, 

 Asia and Africa. All these horses were much like the living spe- 

 and most oi them, are included in the genus lujuus. A 

 complete skeleton of one of them (fujiius SCOttt) found by the 

 American Museum expedition of 1899 in Northern Texas, is 

 mounted in the large wall-case. The difference between it and 

 the Domestic Horse (see framed diagram of modern horse- skel- 

 eton) is chiefly in proportions, the skull shorter with deeper jaws. 

 the legs rather short and feet small in proportion to the body. 

 In these characters this fossil horse resembles an overgrown 

 zebra rather than a domestic horse. We know nothing of its 



ring. It may have been striped, and in this case would have 

 been very zebra-like; but there are some reasons for believing 

 that it was not prominently striped. The bones are petrified, 

 brittle and heavy, the animal matter of the bone having entirely 



ppeared and having been partly replaced by mineral matter. 

 They are not much changed in color, however, and are so per- 

 fectly preserved that they look almost like recent bone 



All the remains of these native horses which have been found 

 in America have been petrified more or less completely; this 



as that they have been buried for many thousands of y< 

 for petrifaction is an exceedingly slow pn - an 



easy method of distinguishing them from bones of the Don* 



rse, found buried in the earth. These cannot in any 1 

 have been buried for more than four or five centuries, and h 

 ad time to petrify. 



Remains of tl from various parts of the 



Unil shown in the I > ery rich 



1 The so-ctilU'l ] 

 obje< • Into them we 



In tr 

 with mineral mat* 



