The Popular Science Monthly, June, 1900: Vol. 57, May, 1900 to October, 1900Various
Science
The Popular Science Monthly, June, 1900: Vol. 57, May, 1900 to October, 1900
Various
Science -- Periodicals; Technology -- Periodicals
We now pass to the experiments made at Penycuik in crossing the zebra
Matopo with various mares of different breeds: 1. Matopo was first
mated with Mulatto, one of Lord Arthur Cecil’s black West Highland
ponies. The result was the hybrid Romulus (see p. 132), which on the
whole, both in mental disposition and bodily form, takes more after his
father than his mother. His striping is even more marked than that of
his sire. He has a semi-erect mane which has been shed annually. The
pattern of the markings, on both body and face, resembles the stripes
on a Somali zebra--which, as we have seen, is regarded by Professor
Ewart as the most primitive type--more than they resemble that of any
of Burchell’s zebras. The profuse striping is a point of difference
between this hybrid and Lord Morton’s. The quagga-hybrid was less
striped than many dun-colored horses.
The mother Mulatto was next mated with a highly bred gray Arab horse,
Benazrek. The offspring agrees in all respects with ordinary foals;
it had, however, a certain number of indistinct stripes, which could
only be detected in certain lights. The stripes were not nearly so
clear as in a foal bred by Mr. Darwin from a cross-bred bay mare and a
thoroughbred, and they disappeared entirely in about five months.
[Illustration: ROMULUS, TWENTY-SEVEN DAYS OLD.]
Recently Mulatto has produced a third foal to Loch Corrie, a sire
belonging to the Isle of Rum group of West Highland ponies, and closely
resembling his mate. This foal was about as much striped as its
immediate predecessor. In both cases the pattern of the stripe differed
not only from that of Matopo, the previous sire, but from that of the
hybrid Romulus. These two foals seem to lend some support to telegony;
but the evidence which might be drawn from the second of them is
destroyed by the fact that the sire Loch Corrie has produced foals from
two West Highland mares, one brown and one black, and each of these
foals has as many and as well marked stripes as the foal of Mulatto.
2. Four attempts were made to cross the zebra with Shetland ponies;
only one succeeded. The hybrid was a smaller edition of Romulus. The
dam Nora had been bred from before, and had produced, by a black
Shetland pony, a foal of a dun color which was markedly striped.
After the birth of the hybrid she was put to a bay Welsh pony; the
resulting foal had only the faintest indication of stripes, which
soon disappeared. It is a remarkable fact that Nora’s foals were more
striped before she had been mated with the zebra than afterward.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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