THE noblest conquest that man ever made on the brute creation was the taming of the Horse, and the engaging him to his service. He lessens the labours of man, adds to his pleasures, advances or flees, with ardour and swiftness, for attack or defence; shares, with equal docility and cheerfulness, the fatigues of hunting, the dangers of war, and draws with appropriate strength, rapidity, or grace, the heavy ploughs and carts of the husbandman, the light vehicles of the rich, and the stately carriages of the great. The first specimen is that of a young Cart Horse. The second figure represents the Hunter and Race Horse.

The Horse is bred now in most parts of the world: those of Arabia, Turkey, and Persia are accounted as better proportioned than many others; but the English Race Horse may justly claim the precedence over all the European breed, and he is not inferior to all the rest in point of strength and beauty.

The beautiful Horses produced in Arabia are in general of a brown colour; their mane and tail very short, and the hair black and tufted. The Arabs for the most part use the Mares in their ordinary excursions; experience having taught them that they are less vicious than the male, and are more capable of sustaining abstinence and fatigue. As they have no other residence but a tent, this also serves for a stable, and the husband, the wife, the child, the Mare, and the Foal, lie together indiscriminately; and the youngest branches of the family may be often seen embracing the neck, or reposing on the body, of the Mare, without any idea of fear or danger.

Of the remarkable attachment which the Arabs have to these animals, St. Pierre has given an affecting instance in his Studies of Nature.- "The whole stock of a poor Arabian of the desert consisted of a beautiful Mare: this the French consul at Said offered to purchase, with an intention to send her to Louis XIV. The Arab, pressed by want, hesitated a long time, but at length consented, on condition of receiving a very considerable sum of money, which he named. The consul wrote to France for permission to close the bargain; and, having obtained it, sent the information to the Arab. The man, so indigent as to possess only a miserable covering for his body, arrived with his magnificent courser: he dismounted, and first looking at the gold, then steadfastly at his Mare, heaved a sigh. To whom is it,' exclaimed he, that I am going to yield thee up? To Europeans! who will tie thee close, who will beat thee, who will render thee miserable! Return with me, my beauty, my jewel! and rejoice

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the hearts of my children:' as he pronounced the last words, he sprung upon her back, and was out of sight almost in a moment."

The intelligence of the Horse is next to that of the elephant, and he obeys his rider with so much punctuality and understanding that the Americans, who had never seen a man on horseback, thought, at first, that the Spaniards were a kind of centaurs, a monstrous race, half men and half horses. The Horse, in a domestic state, seldom lives longer than twenty years; but we may suppose, in a wild state, he might attain double this age; and it is melancholy to think that our bad treatment has shortened the days of so useful a creature. The Mare, his female, is as elegant in her shape. She goes eleven months, and seldom foals double. From the teeth of the Horse his age is known, and his colour, which varies considerably from black to white, from the darkest brown to a light hazel tint, has been reckoned a good sign to judge of his strength and other qualities.

The Horse feeds upon grass, either fresh or dry, and corn; he is liable to many diseases, and often comes suddenly to his end. In the state of nature, he is a gregarious animal, and even in domesticity, his debased situation of slavery has not entirely erased his love of society and friendship; for horses have been known to pine at the loss of their masters, their stable fellows, and even at the death of a dog which had been bred near the manger. Virgil, in his beautiful description of this noble animal, seems to have imitated Job:

"The fiery courser, when he hears from far
The sprightly trumpets, and the shouts of war,
Pricks up his ears, and trembling with delight,
Shifts place, and paws, and hopes the promised fight.
On his right shoulder his thick mane reclined,
Ruffles at speed, and dances in the wind.

His horny hoofs are jetty black and round,
His chine is double; starting with a bound,
He turns the turf and shakes the solid ground.
Fire from his eyes, clouds from his nostrils flow;
He bears his rider headlong on the foe.

Is a beast of burden, undoubtedly very serviceable to mankind. Of greater strength comparatively than most animals of his size, he bears fatigue with patience, and hunger with apparent cheerfulness. A bundle of dried herbs, a thistle on the road, will suffice him for his daily meal, and he compensates with the clear and pure water of a neighbouring brook (on the choice of which he is particularly nice), the want of a better fare. Our treatment of this very useful animal is both wanton and cruel, and most ungrateful, considering the great services he renders us at a little expense. His ears, which are of an uncommon length, are generally mutilated, and he is thus deprived by man of that which nature had intended for ornament and use. He is generally of a dun colour, and wears the form of a cross on his back and shoulders. When very young, the Ass is sprightly, and even tolerably handsome; but he soon loses these qualifications,

either by age or ill treatment, and becomes slow, stupid, and headstrong. The female is passionately fond of her young; and it is said she will even cross fire and water to protect or rejoin it. The Ass is also sometimes greatly attached to his owner, whom he scents at a distance, and plainly distinguishes from ** others in a crowd.

An old man who, a few years ago, sold vegetables in London, used in his employment an Ass, which conveyed his baskets from door to door. Frequently he gave the poor industrious creature a handful of hay, or some pieces of bread, or greens, by way of refreshment or reward. The old man had no need of any goad for the animal, and seldom, indeed, had he to lift up his hand to drive it on. His kind treatment was one day remarked to him, and he was asked if his beast was apt to be stubborn? "Ah! master," replied he, "it is of no use to be cruel, and as for stubbornness I cannot complain; for he is ready to do any thing, and go any where. I bred him myself. He is sometimes skittish and playful, and once ran away from me; you will hardly believe it, but there were more than fifty people after him, attempting in vain to stop him; yet he turned back of himself, and he never stopped till he ran his head kindly into my bosom."

The ancients had a great regard for this animal. Jacob, in his prophecy, compares his son Issachar, and Homer the great Ajax, to an Ass. The Romans had a breed which they held in such high estimation, that Pliny mentions one of the stallions selling for a price greater than three thousand pounds of our money; and he says that in Celtiberia, a province in Spain, a she Ass had colts that were bought for nearly the same sum. The Ass lives nearly to the same age as the horse; and his female's milk has often proved a good remedy against consumptions.