802 THE AMERICAN FARMER. 



now-a-days, holds himself a groom, who is trusted with the care of a horse, even if he do 

 not know how to clean him properly, or to feed him so as not to interfere with his working 

 hours. Every one of these wretched fellows, who has no more idea of a horse s structure or 

 of his constitution than he has of the model of a ship or the economy of an empire, is sure 

 to have a thousand infallible remedies for every possible disease, the names of which he 

 does not know, nor their causes, origin, or operation; and which, if he did know their names, 

 he is entirely incapable of distinguishing, one from the other. These remedies he applies at 

 haphazard, wholly in the dark as to their effect on the system in general, or on the particular 

 disease, and, of course, nine times out of ten he applies them wrongfully, and aggravates 

 fifty-fold the injury he affects to be able to relieve. 



These are the fellows who are constantly administering purgative balls, diuretic balls, 

 cordial balls, on their own hook, without advice, orders, or possible reason and such balls, 

 too! some of them scarcely less fatal than a cannon ball who are continually drugging 

 their horses with nitre in their food, under an idea that it is cooling to the system and that it 

 makes the coat sleek and silky; never suspecting that it is a violent diuretic; that its opera 

 tion on the kidneys is irritating and exhausting in the extreme, and that the only way in 

 which it cools the animal s system is that it reduces his strength, and acts as a serious drain 

 on his constitution. 



These, lastly, are the fellows who are constantly applying hot oils, fiery irritants, and 

 stimulants, to wounds, strains, bruises, or contusions, which in themselves produce violent 

 inflammation, and to which, requiring as they do the use of mild and soothing reme 

 dies, cold lotions, or warm fomentations, the application of these stimulating, volatile 

 essences is much what it would be to administering brandy and cayenne to a man with a 

 brain fever. It should therefore be a positive rule in every stable, whether for pleasure or 

 farm purposes, that not a drachm of medicine is ever to be administered without the express 

 orders of the master. 



The more ordinary diseases and affections of the horse are very similar to those with 

 which we are affected ourselves; their treatment is always analogous, often almost exactly iden 

 tical ; the processes by which relief is to be obtained are the same, and the medicines do not 

 materially differ from those suitable to the human race. It is not too much to say that any 

 intelligent man, gifted with good reasoning powers and not deficient in observation, who 

 knows how to keep his own bo.dily health in a good state, and to deal with his own ordinary 

 ailments, can, within twelve months, qualify himself to treat a horse in all the cases that are 

 likely to befall him, under ordinary circumstances, as well as anybody else, and fifty times 

 better than the stable-keepers, who will sneer at his efforts until they perceive that they are 

 successful, and then will suddenly discover that the means he took are precisely those which 

 themselves recommended. 



The things of great importance which he has to learn, in order to guard against danger, 

 are, how much depletion the system of a horse can endure without danger, and what extent 

 of purgation his bowels can resist undamaged. And to these questions it may be answered, 

 generally, that the horse can bear much more depletion and less purgation than is generally 

 imagined, especially of the drastic drugs usually exhibited. We are very decided opponents 

 of purgatives in general, and have been gratified by observing that the recent cause of veter 

 inary practice, both in France and England, is tending to the entire abandonment of the old 

 system; according to which, every horse, whether anything ailed him or not, was put 

 through two annual courses of purgation, each of three doses, in the Spring and Fall, beside 

 having to bolt a diuretic ball fortnightly, or oftener, according to the whim of the groom, 

 when his kidneys no more required stimulation than his hocks did blistering.&quot; 



Inasmuch as it is generally easier, by proper management and good care, to prevent dis 

 eases than to cure them after they have been contracted, the former will always prove the 



