330 MANUAL OF MODERN FARRIERY 



a very great age when they are looked after with 

 that care which so valuable and useful an animal 

 requires. A remarkable example of this occurred in 

 Warrington, where a horse attained the extraordinary 

 age of seventy-six years, and was well known by the 

 name of Old Billy. As far as I have been able to 

 learn, this was the oldest horse which ever lived, and 

 may hence be considered the Parr among horses. 

 He belonged to the Mersey and Irwell Navigation 

 Company, and more than half his life has been spent 

 in towing boats. The Company, for many of his 

 last years, on account of his great age, kept him 

 without working. In summer he grazed on the 

 luxuriant pasture on the banks of the Mersey, and 

 in winter was taken into stable and fed on mashes 

 and soft food. When he died, the Company had 

 his head preserved, the skin stuffed, and the cranium 

 cleaned, and presented it to the Museum of the 

 Manchester Natural History Society, where it is still 

 to be seen. 



Few people are aware that after a horse has been 

 worked hard or galloped, that his return to a hot 

 stable is nearly as dangerous as subjecting him to a 

 cold atmosphere from a warm stable. Many a horse 

 has been seized with inflammation and fever after 

 having been worked and returned to a hot stable, 

 filled with the noxious gas above alluded to, and 

 more especially if he was cold at the time. Nothing 

 is worse than the sudden change from one tempera- 

 ture to another. From this thousands of horses 

 yearly meet their death. 



Stables should never be built longer than with 

 accommodation for five or six horses, as repose after 

 working is of vital importance ; and where there are 

 many together, it is more than probable that some 



