THE HORSE. 155 



Where the loins are good, not flat sided, and " well 

 ribbed home/' the wider the hips the greater the horse's 

 power : in such case the angularity is softened and the 

 horse is a very superior one for work. 



Narrow Loins. 



Narrow and weak loins are generally found with 

 narrow hips, the defectiveness in this case being even 

 worse than in that of high hips ; but as the two defects 

 generally go together, I had better refer to the article 

 on " High Hips/' Narrow-loined horses are SOUND. 



Long Waist. 



Long waist is a term applied to horses that are very 

 lengthy between the last rib and the haunch-bone : 

 such horses are weakly, have, generally, small loins, but 

 are, so far, SOUND. 



See the preceding two articles. 



Wide behind. 



Horses that spread or straddle their hind-legs when 

 in fast action usually do so to prevent treading on the 

 fore-feet, their shoulders being too upright to allow the 

 fore-feet to be thrown forward sufficiently to be out 

 of reach of the hind ones. They are seldom good 



