Evening star., 1900-08-18
THE WAYS OF THE HORSE
TAKES LONG, CLOSE STUDY TO UN-
DERSTAND HIM THOROUGHLY.
Has Many Quaint Traits That Are
Well Worth WatchinG-Pretty
Tricks of a Pet Colt.
From the Denver News.

From the Denver News.
| You can never even begin to understand
horses until you have watched them at
grass throughout long summer days. The
understanding is more perfect if the watch
! ing begins early-say when the foal is trot-
ting after his sleek dam, going all the gaits,
| though he may be no more than week
old, nipping grass daintily or nuzzling in
the feed trough on the ground, making a
| pretense of eating grain the same his
mother. 1t is only a pretense until the
saucy fellow is a month old. He is foal-
ed with teeth, but does not for while
| learn the use of them.
Horses, If they have souls. no doubt To-
cate them in the upper lips. 1t is a won
| derfully efficient lip. soft as velvet to the
touch and sensitive to the least inequality.
A horse sweeps the manger with 1t almost
! the instant he begins feeding, and IL il
| touches upon knots splinters keeps ware
of them afterward. Before wallowing even
the dullest horse puts down his head until
the upper lip touches the ground, and turns
| slowly round and round, feeling thus all
the space upon which he means to fling
himself down and roll with all his force. II
he finds sharp stones or stubs or sticks he
lifts his head and goes in search of another
place. The lip also tells him when the
| ground is mellow enough to make wallow-
ing a supreme pleasure. Though horses
|
up coated with mud, they do it apparently
| from a sense of duty, with none of the
abandon they display. tossing and tnmbling
| upon light. sun-warmed earth. Often, in
deed, they jump from pasture into plow
| land solely for a wallow exactly to their
minds. The wherefore of wallowing is
still mystery. 1t belongs in the cate
CORY of involuntary motions, along with
stretching and yawning.
IL strains credulity to hear how far a
horse will thrust his lip through an OPEN
ing to reach and bring in coveted titbit
Thus he gets apples lying just inside a
| fence first paving a hole in the earth upon
| his side, then half kneeling to reach un-
der his substitute for fingers. Thus, too
| ne brings to mou'h n lush grass springing up
| beneath the net of a dead bricr clump. A
| thrust of the lip also flips up a gate latch
| when he wishes to go through; as many
thrusts, Jarring up and down. work loose
| the pin that fastens his stall door.
Draw bars he learns to take down with
| his teeth, catching the bar fast and shak-
| ing his head sidewise until one end is jig
eled from the socket. Sometimes. If ex-
| perience has taught him that a gate is
weak in either latch or hinges, he runs
violently against it. bears it down, and Is
| off. Horses in herd have spells when jump
| ing out or In is necessity. They may be
full fed. have shade and water, everything
indeed to satisfy a reasonable animal not
| to say well-bred one, yet out they go.
| Where there is big range-that is to say.
wide commons-they often run for ten miles
| ting back in the most innocent fashion to
| their own proper quarters.
| 1t is not only blood horses that race
| among themselves, free of girth or rein.
When a storm threatens, horses of every
| sort grow full of running they needs
| rust race and jump. Then in a wide pas
| tUre you may see sights such as no course
can offer. In every herd there is a leader,
usually mare. AS the cloud mounts and
| the air grows thick and lifeless. she stops
| grazing, turns her nose to the wind, snorts.
| then falls again to feeding, but only for a
| minute. Her snort was a sort of bugle
| call. The rest answer It, some with low
whinnies. She whinnies back. filings up
| her head and starts off on a trot, looking
| over her shoulder to see If she is followed.
The rest come streaming after. She breaks
| into a sweeping run. Round, round, faster,
| faster, always faster, the herd follows. 1t
| is race for blood, where the best horse
| always wins. Generally it is not the leader.
| She may even be diStanced in the second
| round or the third. Sometimes the pasture s
! circuit is made twenty times before stop
ping. The best horse gains sometimes a
| whole round upon his mates. 1t is he who
| ends the heat. When he has had enough he
| slacks up, turns sideways, lifts head and
| tail and whinnies shrill triumph. But the
triumph never goes to his head. After 1t
he il submissive as ever, coming or 60
ing, jumping out or staying meekly at
| home, quite the lead mare ordains
In size hardly any other domestic animal
is SO diverse as the horse. The average
1900 pounds; Shetland, on the other
hand, may weigh less than 200. But ami
mails cross bred between the diverse races
are true horses, not hybrids, such as re-
suit from interbreeding of Asiatio and
South African asses. Thoroughbred stock
all traces back to Arabia, Percherons to
the barbs left behind by the Moors whom
Charlemagne overthrow in battle. Only
the Percheron bulk could have carried the
weight of knights in ramor. But 1t lie
demonstrable that, weight for weight, the
thoroughbred is stronger, both in bone and
muscle, than his big, handsome feather
legged compeer.
a thoroughbred has bone something be-
tween ivory and flint for hard compact
ness. Percheron bone is soft and spongy.
The big beast pulls great loads over
smooth roads, but in mud soon becomes
leg-weary. A blood cross. otherwise a
thoroughbred one. gives staying power
endurance-to any stock. and very often
symmetry as well. Pure blood is pre-
potent-that is to say, 1t impresses itself
consistently upon offspring. By thorough
bred blood one means always running
blood. Trotters in class apart. Tney
have been developed by judicious adnix-
ture of running blood with common road
stock. and fixed and perpetuated by care
full breeding for trotting conformation from
trotting stock, with still more crosses of
running blood.
The young horse kind and prankish, is
the very best playfellow in the world. AT
least one solitary child found it so. The
my said, indeed, '.she wouldn't nebber git
mar ied-nebber in dis worl'-widout she
took'n stopped the boy-walk and boy-ways
she had" But the tomboy did not very
greatly mind anything SO long as she had
Princess-and time to frolic with her. Prin-
cess was three years old, blood bay, with
black points, gentle dog. full of frolic
kitten. She paStured all summer in
a big old field. but her mistress was hardly
over the fence of II before she came prano-
ing and whickering to meet her. Then,
when the two of them had pow-wowed,
when the sugar or apples had been eaten
and the salt basket hung on high saplng.
Princess stretched herself till her back was
low enough for her playmate to leap upon
it. then went careering off. with her head
high. her tail likewise. prancing a little
as she ran, and giving the least small side
wise jumps. Sometimes she ran thrice
around the field, sometimes it was half =
dozen times. No matter how many. the
rider never got down. Being thrown
the very best part of the fun Princess did
1t SO trickily, always picking the place with
the incest care and feeling it over with her
nose as though she rerself meant to wal
low. Commonly she chose a place slightly