Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 18.djvu/472

456 94) that the yoke, Sanskrit, yuga $$=$$ that which joins, was first invented for the pair of oxen to draw the plow with, it being likely that they were first put to this heavy work, and afterward used for drawing carts, rather than that the idea of drawing a cart by oxen should have occurred before putting them to plow. This, though not absolutely certain, seems a very reasonable argument; while the yoke and pole, being so much better suited to the ox than to the horse, point to oxen as the earliest draught-beasts. The history of successive changes seems well shown in the Latin jumentum, a beast of burden, from jugumentum $$=$$ yoke-ment, which word keeps up the memory of the original yoke, though other modes of transporting burdens had come in. The Latin jumentum is used for the horse, etc., but not for the ox; and French jument has still further lost the old idea, now meaning merely a mare. One further remark is suggested by the harness of the ancient Egyptian chariot, where the yoke is provided with two saddles coming down on the withers of the horses. As is well known, cavalry was by no means general among the armies of the ancient world. The early Aryans, like the Homeric heroes, were charioteers, not horsemen, nor are there any ancient Egyptian horsemen to be seen on the monuments. On the other hand, the warriors of Palestine are there to be seen on horseback, and horse-soldiers appear on the Assyrian sculptures. In old times, however, the horseman is mostly seen riding a barebacked horse, or with a cloth or pad only. It seems to have been gradually that saddles proper began to be used in Assyria, and among the Greeks and Romans. Looking, now, at the Egyptian yoke-saddles of the chariots, one may suspect that from them were derived not only the harness-saddles in modern use, but also our riding-saddles.—Journal of the Anthropological Institute.

 

UT, under all circumstances, make a firm stand against the poison-habit. It is best to call things by their right names, The effect upon the animal economy of every stimulant is strictly that of a poison, and every poison may become a stimulant. There is no bane in the South American swamps, no virulent compound in the North American drug-stores—chemistry knows no deadliest poison—whose gradual and persistent obtrusion on the human organism will not create an unnatural craving after a repetition of the lethal dose, a morbid appetency in every way analogous to the hankering of the toper after his favorite 