The lot of the animals in Macedonia is similar to that of the people. The one survives on grass as the other lives ‘by bread alone.’ The peasant lies down to sleep at night in his clothes, and the heavy-saddled pack-animals are relieved only of their loads. The long, latticed saddle, reaching from before the animal’s shoulders to his haunches, is seldom removed. It becomes in time an integral part of the animal, it conforms somewhat to his shape, and he gives way in places to its lines; and when it does leave a back it often brings hair, and sometimes skin, with it. The animals are not pegged out or tied together when the caravan halts. The system practised is to lock their fore feet with short-chained iron cuffs, or else to tie them with a bit of rope. There are various means of propelling the beasts of burden, but only the carriage-driver uses the Western lash. A donkey is generally sat upon sideways, not astride, and continually beaten with the heels; the horseman wears heavy spurs; the driver of pack-trains, oxen and buffalo teams, carries a pointed stick or a staff with a nail in the end. These last instruments are gently pressed against the hind quarters, and the pressure is kept on till the animal attains the required speed. The buffalo, which is a heavy creature and unable to acquire speed rapidly, lifts his long, snake-like tail and veritably twists it about the tantalising stick. These pitiful-eyed, straight-necked, knock-kneed creatures are larger and more powerful than the ox, and the buffalo cow gives considerably more and richer milk than the domestic variety. But the buffalo is an exceedingly delicate creature, and requires constant care. His hair is long, but thin and scant, and he is addicted to early baldness on the back. In this condition his skin resembles the hide of a rhinoceros. When the weather is warm he drags his slow way along the roads, covered with soft, slimy mud. The driver walks beside him with a crude, long-handled dipper, and at every puddle replenishes the supply of cooling mud. In the winter the black beast maintains the same measured pace, but then he wears a different covering. His thick, coarse blanket protects him from the cold--a thing of broad stripes, brown and white, made of the same material of which his master’s cloak is woven, spun by the peasant wife, probably in the same piece of cloth.