136 THE ADVENTURES OF A GENTLEMAN 



like a veil : it is instantly withdrawn, and in its 

 rapid transit, cleans the eye-ball of dust or foreign 

 particles that may have accidentally lodged upon it. 

 This membrane is called the haw: it is not muscular, 

 but its action is curiously explained ; it is projected 

 from its place by the compression, or rather depres- 

 sion of the eye-ball into the socket, occasioned by 

 the retractor muscle. When the eye is depressed by 

 the play of this muscle, the elasticity of the fatty 

 substance behind the eye-ball causes the haw to ex- 

 tend itself from the corner of the eye, over the visi- 

 ble surface ; when the retractor muscle ceases to act, 

 the eye-ball resumes its usual position, the fat returns 

 to its place behind, and the haw also returns to the 

 socket from which it has been momentarily pushed 

 forward. 



I am the more particular in thus describing the 

 utility and action of the haw, because such is the 

 gross ignorance of the majority of country farriers, 

 that when this membrane has been affected by a 

 temporary inflammation of the eye, and thus become 

 enlarged and more prominent than usual, it has been 

 regarded as a diseased excrescence, and actually ex- 

 tirpated, to the permanent injury of the horse. In- 



