416 MANUAL OF MODERN FARRIERY. 
where he fearlessly meets every danger ; the most appalling 
discharges of musketry and the thunders of a cannonading, 
he faces with a fortitude as dauntless as that of his rider, 
and seems even to enter into the spirit of the attack. This 
has been his character from the earliest ages; for he is 
spoken of in Job, one of the oldest books in the world, and, 
few will deny, one of the best ever written, in the following 
powerful language, which is amended from the common 
translation by my late learned friend Dr. Scot, Professor of 
Hebrew in the College of St. Andrews :— 
“ Hast thou given spirit to the horse % Hast thou clothed 
his neck with a mane % Canst thou make him bound as a 
locust % The majesty of his snorting is terrible. He 
paweth in the valleys and exulteth; he goeth on to meet 
the armed men. He mocketh at fear, and trembleth not; 
nor turneth he back from the sword. Against him rattleth 
the quiver, the glittering spear, and shield. He devours the 
ground with fierceness and rage, and is impatient when 
the trumpet soundeth. He uttereth among the trumpets, 
Ha ! Ha ! He smelleth the battle afar off, the thunder of 
the captains, and the shouting.” 
The time at which the horse was first domesticated is 
now lost in the cloud of antiquity. He is mentioned by 
the earliest writers, and in all probability his subjugation 
has been nearly co-eval with the earliest state of society. 
From the Scriptures we learn that seventeen hundred and 
two years before the Christian era, horses were used ; for in 
the 47 th chapter of Genesis we are told that Joseph gave 
the Egyptians bread in exchange for horses. It seems pro¬ 
bable, from the earlier chapters of Genesis, that horses were 
unknown to the Hebrews and Egyptians; as we find from 
the 12th chapter of that book that Abraham “ had sheep 
and oxen, and men-servants, and maid-servants, and she- 
