MODERN FARRIER. 13 



mark, as it requires a great deal of experience to 

 form a tolerable guess of his age. 



In order to make a very young horse or colt ap- 

 pear older than he is, horse-dealers sometimes pull 

 out the foal-teeth : but this trick may be detected 

 by feeling along the edges where the tushes grow, 

 for they may be felt in the gums before the corner- 

 teeth are put forth ; but if the corner-teeth come in 

 some months before the tushes rise in the gums, 

 there is reason to suspect that the foal-teeth have 

 been pulled out at three years old. Sometimes a 

 mark is burned with a small hot iron ; but this de- 

 ception is also easily discovered, because this mark 

 is generally blacker, and stronger impressed, than 

 the true one. 



Some horses have but indifferent mouths, even 

 when they are young ; w^hile others retain marks of 

 freshness and vigour till they are sixteen years old 

 and upwards. When a horse becomes old, his gums 

 wear away insensibly, leaving his teeth long and 

 bare at the roots; the bars of the mouth become 

 dry and smooth, and the eye-pits sunk and hollow. 

 Grey horses in old age turn very white; and black 

 ones grow grey over their eye-brows. The back 

 also grows hollow, the joints* stiff, and the aspect 

 becomes ghastly and melancholy. 



5. Abuse of Medicine. 



It is a very common practice, among grooms and 

 farriers, to bleed and physic a horse both in the 

 spring and fall of the year, though he be in ever 

 so good health and condition. If he be destined to 

 undergo any extraordinary exertion, as racing or 

 hunting, it is judged absolutely necessary, by these 

 sagacious practitioners, to prepare him by bleeding, 

 purging, and sweating in a hot stable. Nothing 

 can be more absurd and dangerous ; for if we o-ive 

 medicines to an animal in a healthy state, we either 



