The daily morning journal and courier., 1894-08-09
DOMESTIC ANIMALS.
The Dangers of Their Wild Progenitors
 Developed Traits Useful Now.

The Dangers of Their Wild Progenitors Developed Traits Useful Now.
 We value the he. SC for his speed and endurance. Yet had 1t not been for the chief ancestor of our faithful friend the dog-i. e., the grim gray wolf of Europe and Asia. with his everlasting hunger and untiring gallop-the wild horses which swarmed over the great plains of the old world. and from which all our modern steeds have sprung. would never have developed the swiftness and staying power they possessed and have transmitted to their descendants.
 The wolves and the wild horses were constantly at war and. moreover. the wolf was the only predatory beast ex- isting the ancient times which was able to pursue the horses and hunt them down out in the open steppe. The gal loping power was undoubtedly devel- oped to enable him to escape these gaunt, persistent foes. So certain does this appear to me that I never see a wolf in a menaSerie without feeling in- clined to raise my hat to him and thank him for many an exhilarating gallop on horseback. If his bloodthirs- ty forefathers had never existed there would have bee little to choose between a horse and a donkey.
 It must be borne in mind that such influences were at work from day to day, from year to year, and from cen tury to century during immense epochs before ever the first wild horse was las soed by man. It seems, strange that this long and bitter feud between the equidae and the canidae should now be almost forgotten. Horses seldom show an instructive emnity to dogs in the same way that cattle do. Probably this is because they are SO closely asso- ciated together in their common state of servitude to man. The horse is an intelligent animal, and readily finds out who are is friends. Probably, also, when wild he had little fear of a sin gle wolf, for he had plenty of courage and was a skillful fighter with hoofs and teeth. Occasionally, however, the old dread and enmity crop up. I have known young horses when surrounded by a pack of fox hounds for the first time to become almost frantic with fear.
 . We know that the horses wild fore ited the open plains and trusted chiefly to their speed to escape. from their en- emies. This becomes all the more evil dent when we examine @ young foal. All young creatures tend to resemble the earlier types from which the race has sprung more than the adults do. The legs of the foal are enormously de- veloped from birth. He looks absurdly Ikea horse on stilts, and when four or five days old he can gallop almost as fast as he ever will in his life. He holds his head up boldly and never tries to slink away and hide like a young calf or lawn, whose ancestors dwe1t in the forest. There is a story that thoroughbred foal of about a month old once beat a race horse over @ half mile course. His dam was mare celebrated for her speed, and she had a jockey on her back. She out stripped the rival horse and her long, legged offspring kept level with her with ease. ,'. r. |us
 If you watch how a young colt takes his nourishment you will see that his habits tell the same story. He never takes full meal in the way that young calf does, but keeps constantly rushing to his mother and refreshing himself every few minutes This shows, first, that 1t is not his custom to be long absent from his dam, as are young animals which lie hidden among the thickets while their parents go to seek food. It shows. secondly, that his stomach is never so loaded with meal as to hinder his running powers, which were all important when the youngest member of the band had to keep up with the rest of their flight from wolves or other enemies. Again, a colt when he lies down, does not curl himself up in small compass, as if to escape observation, after the bashful manner of the calf. but extends his long limbs conspicuously North American. Review. x 5,,., .