THE LIVING WORLD. 
556 
the misplaced body of the sheep than the proper body for even the small horse. 
His legs are lean and lank instead of exhibiting that tapering from thigh to 
fetlock which even the sorriest equine specimen possesses. His coat of hair is 
so coarse, so rough, as to suggest some wool-bearing animal, rather than the 
hairy apparel of even the least-cared-for specimen of the species horse. Even 
the woolly horse of the great showman was sleek and well curried in compari¬ 
son. The tarpan replaces the mane, which is as distinctive of the horse as the 
pig-tail is of the “celestial,” by bushy, furzy side-whiskers which extend the 
whole length of his jaw. The month and nostrils, too, are “bearded like a 
pard,” and suggest the organs of a goat; the ears are niggardly in appearance 
because set far backhand looking like those of some cropped wolf; the forehead 
THE fallen MONARCH beset by hyenas, jackals, vultures and lions. 
projects, the curves of the body are all replaced by straight lines, so that taken all 
in all the tarpan looks as if he might have come out of a Noah’s ark constructed 
for the amusement of the children of a Titan. Finally there is hardly a varia¬ 
tion of color, since the dirty whitish-brown which belongs to most tarpans , passes 
in exceptional cases into' nothing but a blacker or a whiter shade. They are 
gregarious to but a slight degree, since a herd will rarely exceed twenty-five 
in number, unless the necessity for seeking other lands, or the presence of some 
great danger happens to unite several herds into a troop. Still the tarpan is 
adapted by structure and by habits to life upon the steppes, for his diminutive 
stature causes him to require less food; his life in small herds renders it more 
