THE HORSE A COMPLETE ANIMAL. 131 



and locality have not that influence over the hoof 

 which they are vulgarly supposed to have. 



It is being continually argued that the horse, as 

 we have him, must not be looked upon as being in 

 his natural state, but in an artificial one. Surely a 

 little reflection should lead educated people to per- 

 ceive that it is we ourselves who have, by continually 

 striving against Nature, unnecessarily and insanely 

 nursed him into an artificial state. People lose 

 sight of the undeniable fact that he was created 

 expressly as a servant for man, and as such was 

 destined to become a captive and a domesticated 

 animal. Simple domestication would not render 

 him artificial ; but pampering, continual doctoring, 

 and adding to, or subtracting from, his frame will 

 do so. 



The Great Architect of the Universe neither 

 made too little, nor too much, nor did he assign to 

 the horse any inadequate members. Other quadru- 

 peds possess both collar-bones and a gall-bladder, 

 the horse has neither ; but no one, however sapient, 

 can detect that this inscrutable economy of con- 

 struction has rendered him the less powerful, the 

 less fleet, or the less enduring. It was needful that 

 his head should be of a certain size to lodge the 

 many organs which it contains, to provide leverage 

 for the jaw with its powerful muscles, &c. ; and Mr. 

 Fearnley, formerly Principal of and Lecturer on 

 Veterinary Surgery at the Edinburgh Veterinary 

 College, writing, in March last year, a treatise on 

 the structure of the horse, tells us that the head is 

 K 2 



