Note {13} — Chapter XVII

Note 13.—Mr. Nelson says of the Madura country: “The horse is a miserable, weedy, and vicious pony; having but one good quality, endurance. The breed is not indigenous, but the result of constant importations and a very limited amount of breeding.” (The Madura Country, Pt. II. p. 94.) The ill success in breeding horses was exaggerated to impossibility, and made to extend to all India. Thus a Persian historian, speaking of an elephant that was born in the stables of Khosru Parviz, observes that “never till then had a she-elephant borne young in Irán, any more than a lioness in Rúm, a tabby cat in China (!), or a mare in India.” (J. A. S. sér. III. tom. iii. p. 127.)