22 



CHAPTEK IV. 



LITTER XENOPHON AND LORD PEMBROKE ON BARE PAVING 

 FOR STALLS PHYSICKING AND BLISTERING THE BEARING 

 REIN. 



SERVANTS are apt to be very exacting as to the quan- 

 tity of straw for litter, and they keep some all day 

 long under the horse's feet, ignorantly believing that 

 it is a comfort and a benefit to the horse. Here, 

 again, they are wrong ; and upon both points. Let 

 any proprietor go to his stable, upon returning on 

 a Sunday from morning church service, when the 

 horses will, perhaps, have been left to themselves for 

 three hours, and he will find that his horses have 

 been trying to get rid of it by scraping holes in it, 

 in which to stand in ease and comfort on the bare 

 floor, having pushed as much as they can back into 

 the gangway. It is probable, also, that instinct 

 takes part in their dislike to it, on the score of its 

 being unhealthy, as well as uncomfortable to them. 



Xenophon wrote in praise of a bare stone pave- 

 ment : * It will cool, harden, and improve a horse's 

 feet merely by standing on it.' Lord Pembroke 

 says: 'The constant use of litter makes the feet 

 tender, and causes swelled legs ; moreover, it renders 



