Burlington weekly free press. [volume] (Burlington, Vt.) 1866-1928, 1892-01-21

- e.
The WILD HORSE.
he Makes Rovers of Ills Domestioated
Brethren When Ho Meets Them.

he Makes Rovers of His Domesticated
Brethren When Ho Meets Them.
Very young students, in their first At
pmpts At composition, often informed us
hat the horse is useful animal This
weeping generalization is subject to i'm
po1'tant notifications before it Is accepted
n all communities. There are many thou
lands Of horses that toll net like their pro
genitors, but 40 like the wind where it
hsteth, and are looked upon rs intolerable
nuisances in the civilized regions they
sometimes invade. Our Australian friends,
for instance, are no lovers of the horse in
his untained state, and some of the colonies
ut II price upon his head, and do all they
Ian to stimulate movements for his de-
ItruCtion.
Several thousand wild horses were shot
in New South Wales alone in lSi5. These
rovers Of the plains play the mischief with
aomesticated animals when they come
among them, and the colonists are very
much Disguised to observe that the noble
horse, relapsing into barbarsm, and for
getting Lis oats and the other comforts Of
civilization, runs off with his wild breth.
rem who have not enjoyed his superior adj
vantagcs.
1t must be confessed that our horses need
the restraint imposed upon them to prevent
them from disgracing their ancestors, who
we're certainly domesticated when they
were introduced into this country. Years
ago it used to be the custom in our sout h.
western territory to brand the young stock,
and even many work animals and turn
them loose to shift for themselves for IA
year or two. When they were wanted
they were always as wild as MeXican mus.
Powell n ha
best method of tanning wild horses The
specimens on which he exerted his talents
ms a tanner were for the most part former
ly domestiCatcd animals, who had forgotten
all about their restraints while wandering
over the plains of our southwestern terri
tory.
Travellers in western territories are no
longer in danger of such an eruption of
horsefiesh as Murray described in his
"Travels in North America" lie not only
witnessed IL stampede of thousands of
panic stricken horses, but the living tor
rent swept along toward and over his
camp trampling skins and dried meat into
the ground, knocking down some of the
tents and taking with them all its horses
except his riding mare who vainy strIIg-
gled to break her fastenngs. They still
range in much smaller herds than former
ly on the plains Of the upper Colorado. but
the wild hcrsc like the buffalo has prtc-
tically disappeared before the advance of
the white man.
In spite of the experience of the Austral-
lans, many peoples, chiefly savage, have
been able to turn the wild horse to good
account. Hundreds of thousands of Mexi
can mustangs have been reduced to servi
tude. The wild horse Of the South Ameri
can pampas, which three centuries ago
only fifteen years after the horse was intro
duced from Europe, had spread TO regions
rs remote as Patagonia, has been tanned by
thousands and has become the useful serv.
ant Of Indian tribes.
NaturH often discuss the question
whether there is now in the world such a
creature as an aboriginal or truly wild
horse. We know very well that the wild
horses OF the western hemisphere are all
descendants of domesticatcd animals.
Where, then, is the aboriginal wild horse
to be found? The question will probably
never he settled. Mr. j. II. Steel thinks
the evidence is in favor of the existence of
the wild horse in central Asia Gcsner, the
great authority on zoology of the Sixteenth
century, was Of the same opinion, but the
TACT has often been questioned and the
assertion cannot positively he made that
the wild horse Of the treat mountain
region which the Russians are now cx-
plorinG, and Of which they have secured
some specimens, is not himself the de-
Scendant of ancient domestic animals
Loldthwaite's geographical Magazine.