That if you ask one of these banditti to sell his mare, his answer
is, that on her speed depends his own head. He says also, the
stone colts are so little regarded, that it is difficult to find a
Horse of any tolerable size and shape amongst them.
If this then is the case, shall we be any longer at a loss to
account for the deformity of an animal, who, from his infancy, is
neglected, starved, and dried up, for want of juices? or shall we
wonder that his offspring, produced in a land of plenty, of whom
the greatest care is taken, who is defended from the extremity of
heat and cold, whose food is never limited, and whose vessels are
filled with the juices of the sweetest herbage, shall we wonder, I
say, that his offspring, so brought up, should acquire a more
perfect shape and size than his progenitor? or if the Sire is not
able to race, shall we wonder that the Son, whose shape is more
perfect, should excel his Sire in all performances?
But there is another reason why many of the very finest of these
foreign Horses cannot race: our observations of them will shew us,
that though their shoulders in general exceedingly incline
backwards, yet their fore-legs stand very much under them; but in
different Horses this position is more or less observable. This,
(when I considered the laws of nature) appeared to me the greatest
imperfection a Stallion could possibly have: but when this
gentleman informed me it was the custom of the Turks always to
keep each fore-leg of the Horse chained to the hinder one, of each
side, when not in action, I no longer considered it as a natural,
but an acquired imperfection.
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