fifteen centuries during which we know that the greatest care has been taken to keep them pure in blood and to train them to the work for which they were required. The tradition as to the Berber horse of Barbary is much simpler, as these robber tribes have not developed poets or historians, and content themselves with saying that the horses have always been there. And so far as we are concerned that statement is as satisfactory as any other. But we do know that supplies of these horses were obtained by Saladin in his domestic wars, and were used also in his contests with the faith-breaking crusaders who vainly tried to destroy the Moslem rule and obtain perpetual possession of Jerusalem. From the earliest times it has been a mooted point as to which was the superior, the Berber or the Nejdee. Among the Europeans who have lived much in Egypt this is still a disputed matter, and when Count de Lesseps was a young man he endeavored to decide the question by a series of races at 4½ kilometers (about 2⅘ miles). Other horses, however, were admitted. In the first heat there were three Nejdee horses all bred in Cairo—the purity of the blood being open to suspicion—and one Syrian horse. A Cairo-bred Nejdee was the winner. In the second heat there were three Nejdee horses, one bred in Cairo, and one Barbary horse from Tunis owned and ridden by Count de Lesseps himself. The Barb won. In the third heat there were three Nejdee horses, one of them ridden by de Lesseps, and one Samean horse. A Cairo-bred Nejdee horse won. In the fourth heat there were three Nejdee horses and one Egyptian horse from Abfeh. A Nejdee horse was the winner. Then came the final heat between the winners of the trial heats. The result was that the de Lesseps Barbary horse was first, a Cairo-bred Nejdee horse was second, and Nejdee horses third and fourth.