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be urged that in many places the steam plough is to be seen at 
work, but this is an expensive method of tilling the land, and can 
only be pursued by the more wealthy and prosperous agriculturists, 
and the fact remains that for harvesting the grain or other produce 
of the soil, and for conveying it to the market, the horse is an in¬ 
dispensable necessity. It should be remembered too that horses 
form part of the stock-in-trade of the agriculturist, and throughout 
the length and breadth of the country are bred either for sale at 
country fairs or for disposal to private purchasers. Take again 
local trade and commerce of all descriptions. It would be im¬ 
possible to secure that punctuality and despatch in the delivery 
of goods, which is the pride of our British tradesmen, were it not 
for the assistance of the horse, to whose strength and speed we owe 
in the main the arrival of many of the commodities and necessities 
of life. Take again the case of cavalry and artillery, and the 
impossibility of substituting any other animal for the horse in 
those branches of the service. Imagine the Uhlans of the German 
Army performing their arduous task of scouting on mules, or the 
English Life Guards entering into action on donkeys! The former 
with proverbial obstinacy might carry their riders into the very 
jaws of the foe, while the latter would be unable to sustain the 
gigantic proportions and colossal weight of our Household Troops. 
Had these interesting animals, useful enough in their way, 
taken the place of horses, the many glorious records now inscribed 
upon the roll of our national fame would be conspicuous by their 
absence. It has been said that cavalry should be rarely used in 
battle except to commence an action or to complete a rout, and 
certainly without the assistance of cavalry a battle would never 
be properly commenced, nor a rout successfully completed. The 
lady of fashion in her well-appointed barouche, the disciple of 
Nimrod on his hunter, the jockey on the high-mettled race¬ 
horse, the doctor in his brougham, the man of business in a 
hack-cab, the butcher boy in his cart, give us hourly and daily 
proofs of how large a part in our daily life, be it one of business or 
pleasure, the horse has to bear. 
There is an ancient Eastern proverb to the effect that when 
Allah first formed the world, he tempered the lightning with the 
west wind and so created the horse. We, who live in a practical 
age, are well aware that this is but a romance born of Oriental 
hyperbole, but it is one of those traditions handed down from 
generation to generation, which at all events serve by way of illus- 
