374 MEDICAL SECTION 



born and recognized that it was of paramount importance. 

 Well, now to deal with horses. On the farms all over the 

 world it was the recognized practice by those who under- 

 stood their work that the farm mares should be kept work- 

 ing right up to the time when the foal was born. Some- 

 times the mare was worked right up to the very day that 

 she was delivered of the foal; although, of course, the 

 work was not the ordinary work. For instance, if they 

 were heavy draught horses they were kept at light work, 

 but still they were kept steadily at work every day, and 

 the more valuable the mare the more anxious was the 

 farmer to see that she was safeguarded in this way. He 

 did not pay particular attention to feeding, but he paid 

 every attention to the fact that she should be kept in 

 reasonable condition and properly exercised. To deal with 

 another class of horses racehorses. A man who had to 

 do with a large stable communicated this: " In regard to 

 our stud we had a farm where there was rich pasture and 

 they were supplied with good feed and they had not much 

 exercise in the paddock. We found as a result that we 

 had to deliver by hand quite a considerable number of 

 foals. The mothers had not sufficient vitality to bear their 

 progeny in the ordinary way and they had to be helped 

 by similar means as were necessary in regard to human 

 beings. Giving them a large amount of exercise did away 

 with all that." As regards sheep, if they had heavy pas- 

 tures with scanty feed they did well, but if they had good 

 pastures where the sheep did not have to go far for their 

 feed they did not do so well, and it was the practice with 

 regard to sheep so conditioned to turn the dogs in on them 

 to hustle them about and so make them have sufficient 

 exercise. So all round they must come to the conclusion 

 that this matter of exercise was most important. And they 

 must remember the great dislike of the human being to 

 take exercise. From the beginning of language the word 

 synonymous with labour was pain. They all tried to loaf 

 and they would all have to try and get rid of that habit. 



Dr. SMART (Aberdeen) said that with some trepidation 

 he wished to join issue with the last eloquent speaker and 

 this was with regard to the influence of nourishment on 

 expectant mothers. Dr. Truby King fortunately lived 

 under different conditions from those of this country. He 

 (Dr. Smart) had clinical charge of a large consultation 

 in Aberdeen where they had some 300 mothers, and he 

 must confess that over and over again on consultation day 

 he found many of these mothers suffering from want of 

 food and absolutely unfitted to nurse their children because 



