PANICS AMONG HORSES. 
7C9 
sequence of being unshod. On the 10th of June, about 
eleven o’clock at night, when everything was perfectly 
still and all seemed plunged in sleep, an extraordinary 
and frightful tumult suddenly broke out, which threw 
the whole camp into a state of alarm. Cries of Arabs, 
screaming of horses, and a heavy rumbling sound like the 
echo of a rising storm, were heard gradually approaching 
the place where M. Decroix was located with his regiment. 
In an instant the bivouac was invaded by a multitude of 
scared horses, mules, and asses tearing along. These were 
but a portion of the animals, the remainder, numbering from 
1800 to 2000, being dispersed over the plain. Many of these 
ran immense distances, and were not found until next day ; 
some were not even brought in until several days afterwards. 
Strange to say, the animals collected had another panic, 
though not so serious, and many again escaped. It appears 
that in the first panic all the animals were instantaneously 
affected with terror, broke all their fastenings, overthrew 
every one who attempted to oppose their flight, trod under 
foot those lying asleep on the ground, and injured several 
severely. The French thought that a wild beast* a lion or 
hyaena, had caused the alarm, while the Arabs maintained 
that it was owing to having encamped on the spot where a 
Marabout had been buried, and whose ashes were in this way 
profaned. 
At mid-day, the following day, there was another slight 
commotion, but it was easily controlled by the Arabs. No 
wild creature was seen. 
The second example occurred in 1859, in Italy, among 
the horses of the 10th Chasseurs. They had just encamped, 
when all at once the horses of one squadron, then those of a 
second, then a third, took fright, broke away from their fast- 
enings, threw down and wounded the men, and fled wildly 
over all kinds of obstacles as if they had been carried on 
the wings of the wind ; they scattered in every direction, and 
ran for miles, and as they were saddled and bridled the troops 
they passed in their headlong career imagined there had been 
an engagement, and that the riders had been killed. The horses 
of the remaining squadrons, as well as those of the band, hap- 
pened to be in the hands of their riders, who were able to hold 
them. There was here again no cause for panic ; the horses 
were hungry and the grass was plentiful, so that there was 
every inducement for the animals to remain quiet. 
The third instance was observed among the horses of the 
9th Cuirassiers, at Gallipoli, in 1854. On the 16th of July, 
at eleven o’clock in the evening, when every one except the 
