130 
ON THE ORIGIN OF THE HORSE. 
and the 36th and 61st of east longitude, by the rabble mob 
which followed the early fortunes of the prophet for the sake of 
spoil. Either the gentleman has misunderstood his authorities, 
or there exists a great difference in the opinion of the various 
authors who have written on the subject. 
“Non nostrum tantas componere lites!”■— virgil. 
“ Who shall decide when doctors disagree V* —pope. 
It was not until the ninth year of the Hegira that the different 
tribes who had hitherto been waiting the issue of the war between 
Mahomet and the Koreish joined him : some time after this, we 
find him in the plenitude of his power; and in the details of the 
different wars in which he engaged, we find that he was assisted 
by numerous bodies of horse. 
There is a curious narrative related in Gibbon of the private 
arsenal of the prophet, consisting of “nine swords, three lances, 
seven pikes, a quiver and three bows, seven cuirasses, three 
shields, and two helmets ; with a large white standard, a black 
banner, and twenty horses.” After the prophet’s death, when 
the different tribes were united at the taking of Damascus, and 
in the war with the Persians, Syrians, Egyptians, Spaniards, 
Sec. &c.'the Moslem army, besides infantry and camels, con¬ 
sisted, at one time, of 15,000, at another 20,000, and at another 
25,000 horse. 
It would be tedious to follow the different details of the nume¬ 
rous battles in which they engaged : sufficient has already been 
produced to convince every impartial person, that the Arabs, in 
the seventh century, possessed horses in immense numbers; and. 
to prove that their breed was thought as highly of at that period 
by the neighbouring countries as it is at this present time, in the 
54th year of the Hegira, in a treaty concluded between the Mos¬ 
lems and the Turks, the Arabs were allowed to keep the territo¬ 
ries they had gained, in consideration of paying 3000 pounds 
weight of gold, fifty slaves, and as many choice horses. 
From what has been stated, we consider that we were fully 
justified, in the last number of The Veterinarian, in con¬ 
cluding that Arabia possessed horses at a very early period of 
the world, on the authority of the Book of Job; a work com¬ 
posed by a person in a remote age, in the same country, and in 
the Arabic language; who, in describing the natural history of 
the deserts of Arabia, shews that he was not only well ac¬ 
quainted with the qualifications of the horse for the purposes of 
war, 
