[95] ‘Narrative of Voyages,’ vol. ii. p. 180.

[96] J. Crawfurd ‘Descript. Dict. of the Indian Islands,’ p. 255. The Madagascar cat is said to have a twisted tail; see Desmarest in ‘Encyclop. Nat. Mamm.,’ 1820, p. 233, for some of the other breeds.

[97] Admiral Lutké’s Voyage, vol. iii. p. 308.

[98] ‘Zoology of the Voyage of the Beagle, Mammalia,’ p. 20. Dieffenbach ‘Travels in New Zealand,’ vol. ii. p. 185. Ch. St. John ‘Wild Sports of the Highlands,’ 1846, p. 40.

[99] Quoted by Isid. Geoffroy ‘Hist. Nat. Gén.,’ tom. iii. p. 427.

CHAPTER II.
HORSES AND ASSES.

HORSE. DIFFERENCES IN THE BREEDS—INDIVIDUAL VARIABILITY OF—DIRECT EFFECTS OF THE CONDITIONS OF LIFE—CAN WITHSTAND MUCH COLD—BREEDS MUCH MODIFIED BY SELECTION—COLOURS OF THE HORSE—DAPPLING—DARK STRIPES ON THE SPINE, LEGS, SHOULDERS, AND FOREHEAD—DUN-COLOURED HORSES MOST FREQUENTLY STRIPED—STRIPES PROBABLY DUE TO REVERSION TO THE PRIMITIVE STATE OF THE HORSE.

ASSES. BREEDS OF—COLOUR OF—LEG- AND SHOULDER-STRIPES—SHOULDER-STRIPES SOMETIMES ABSENT, SOMETIMES FORKED.

The history of the Horse is lost in antiquity. Remains of this animal in a domesticated condition have been found in the Swiss lake-dwellings, belonging to the Neolithic period.[[1]] At the present time the number of breeds is great, as may be seen by consulting any treatise on the Horse.[[2]] Looking only to the native ponies of Great Britain, those of the Shetland Isles, Wales, the New Forest, and Devonshire are distinguishable; and so it is, amongst other instances, with each separate island in the great Malay archipelago.[[3]] Some of the breeds present great differences in size, shape of ears, length of mane, proportions of the body, form of the withers and hind quarters, and especially in the head. Compare the race-horse, dray-horse, and a Shetland pony in size, configuration, and disposition; and see how much greater the difference is than between the seven or eight other living species of the genus Equus.

Of individual variations not known to characterise particular breeds, and not great or injurious enough to be called monstrosities, I have not collected many cases. Mr. G. Brown, of the Cirencester Agricultural College, who has particularly attended to the dentition of our domestic animals, writes to me that he has “several times noticed eight permanent incisors instead of six in the jaw.” Male horses only should have canines, but they are occasionally found in the mare, though a small size.[[4]] The number of ribs on each side is properly eighteen, but Youatt[[5]] asserts that not unfrequently there are nineteen, the additional one being always the posterior rib. It is a remarkable fact that the ancient Indian horse is said in the Rig-Vêda to have only seventeen ribs; and M. Piétrement,[[6]] who has called attention to this subject, gives various reasons for placing full trust in this statement, more especially as during former times the Hindoos carefully counted the bones of animals. I have seen several notices of variations in the bones of the leg; thus Mr. Price[[7]] speaks of an additional bone in the hock, and of certain abnormal appearances between the tibia and astragalus, as quite common in Irish horses, and not due to disease. Horses have often been observed, according to M. Gaudry,[[8]] to possess a trapezium and a rudiment of a fifth metacarpal bone, so that “one sees appearing by monstrosity, in the foot of the horse, structures which normally exist in the foot of the Hipparion,”—an allied and extinct animal. In various countries horn-like projections have been observed on the frontal bones of the horse: in one case described by Mr. Percival they arose about two inches above the orbital processes, and were “very like those in a calf from five to six months old,” being from half to three-quarters of an inch in length.[[9]] Azara has described two cases in South America in which the projections were between three and four inches in length: other instances have occurred in Spain.