The morning call., 1894-11-30
HORSEY,

The advent of the horseY season is set
ting newspaper writers all over the coun-
try TO dig up mention of the horse in liter
AZURE and TO make a display of equine
erudition. The noble animal fills large
place in poetry and bellies lettres, and now
that society is flocking to admire him at
the pavilion horsey "reminiscences are in
order.
The first use which man made of the
horse was to eat him; there is doubt
that the aboriginal Americans would no
more have thought of riding pliohippus
or mesohippus than We would think of
riding goat like the man In the nursery
rhyme. But long before the ancient AssY-
rlans learned to write letters on the clay
tablets which the American exploring ex-
petition is now digging up man had
learned to ride the fiery animal whose neck
the Almighty had clothed with thunder
the war charger who said among the trum-
pets, Ha ha, who smelt the battle afar off
ana heard the thunder of the captains and
the shouting. Warehouses carried into the
heart of the Hebrew villages those young
warriors whose attractions, according to
Ezekiel, proved so irresistible to the maid
ems of Israel; when the Greek chariots
dashed round the walls of Troy the clatter
of the hoofS of their steeds made the earth
tremble, and shook what Virgil finely calls
the putrem campum. Yet the horse of the
ante-Christian era was q smaller animal
than ours, and not as symmetrical, as the
MesopOtamian sculptures show.
How would the Cid's Baveca compare
with modern heavy cavalry charger
He was swift and he carried a man in
armor at good, round pace; but his en-
durance was not equal to that of the
Moorish barbs, which fought all day, and
when defeat befell carried their riders far
from the battlefield before midnight His
sagacty was fully up to the modern level,
for when they pu: the dead Cid on his
back and led him forth through the lines
of the enemy he never broke out of walk
or tried to curvet, for fear of dumping his
dead master into the dust. Bavieca was
cross between the Arab of the desert and
the Iennet of Spain, and probably pos
sessed the N atchless virtues of the former.
Our horses are, for the most part. de-
rived from cross between this same Arab
and the heavy Flemish drafthorse, which
was ridden by the knights of the middle
ages. The Arab horse was imported into
oDUuO WV nuHuISu years ago.
He was a small horse, about fourteen
hands high, but among his get were Fly
ing ChilderS, whose posterity included
Eclipse and the winners Of the eighteenth
century. BY crossing these animals with
Flemish horses OF great weight and power
and not less than sixteen hands high the
modern thoroughbred was evolved. To this
breed belonged Old Whitley which Gen =
eral Taylor rode at Buena Vista, the sor-
rel which William III rode IN Ireland, the
noble beast which bore the good news to
Client, the charger which saved the day
by carrying Sheridan into the fight from
Winchester twenty miles away. the steady
warhorse Copenhagen, which, according to
the legend, bore Wellington to Bucher's
headquarters in the night before the bat
tie of Waterloo and brought him back
again in time TO win the fight and hun
dred other horses famed in history and
poetry.
In our crack horses there is generally
small but perceptible strain of native
blood which does not improve them. The
native horse of the prairies and of the
southern lOw-lying barreOs is al animal of
inferior grade, ranking below the Arabian,
the Norman and Flemish and the English
blend of these; like the Texan steer. he is
only good to build upon. In course of
time his strain of blood will be bred out,
and the American horse, with the advan-
tage of finer climate to grow up in, will
be able TO compete TO advantage for the
Derby and the Grand Prix de Paris. In
the meantime. owing to a variety of causes,
horses have now become so cheap here
that WIN has ranch napH 6aOU
himself stable of well-bred beasts. Ex-
ceedingly wel-bred animals are selling at
PalO Alto for S25, and the prices offered
for Mr.. Haggin's stock the other day were
so low that he preferred 70 keep them on
the chance of finding a winner among the
lot rather than part with them