In the “Edinburgh Journal of Natural History,” we find the following passage:—“We are assured by Mr. Youatt, that in Auvergne fat soups are given to cattle, especially when sick or enfeebled, for the purpose of invigorating them. The same practice is observed in some parts of North America, where the country people mix, in winter, fat broth with the vegetables given to their cattle, in order to render them more capable of resisting the severity of the weather. These, broths have been long considered efficacious by the veterinary practitioners of our own country in restoring horses which have been enfeebled through long illness. It is said by Peall to be a common practice in some parts of India to mix animal substances with the grain given to feeble horses, and to boil the mixture into a sort of paste, which soon brings them into good condition, and restores their vigour. Pallas tells us that the Russian boors make use of the dried flesh of the Hamster reduced to powder, and mixed with oats; and that this occasions their horses to acquire a sudden and extraordinary degree of _embonpoint_. Anderson relates, in his ‘History of Iceland,’ that the inhabitants feed their horses with dried fishes when the cold is very intense, and that these animals are extremely vigorous, though small. We also know that in the Feroe Islands, the Orkneys, the Western Islands, and in Norway, where the climate is very cold, this practice is also adopted; and it is not uncommon in some very warm countries,—as in the kingdom of Muskat, in Arabia Felix, near the straits of Ormuz, one of the most fertile parts of Arabia, fish and other animal substances are there given to the horses in the cold season, as well as in times of scarcity.”
From horses eating to horses eaten, the transition is easy and natural. Wherever the animal exists in an unreclaimed state, its flesh is a staple article of food. The Kirghis Kassaks pursue it with hawks, and shoot it with arrows, or drive it into the Caspian Sea to be drowned. The Calmucks, Mongols, and other Tartars, make use of horse meat, and manufacture a weak spirit, called koumiss, from mare’s milk. The mounted Indians of South America have no other food than the flesh, milk, and blood of their mares, which they never ride; and the only luxury in which they indulge habitually, is that of washing their hair in mare’s blood. They are fond indeed of intoxicating liquors, which they drink to excess when they can procure them from the white men; but this happens only on rare occasions, and they have none of their own manufacture.