VETERINARY DENTAL SURGERT. 179 



As to the cause of this troublesome vice, it occurs 

 mostly in young horses that are well fed and 

 insufficiently worked. There is no doubt also a 

 special predisposition to the habit; with some horses 

 it appears to arise naturally, as though the sucking or 

 gulping down of air gave them pleasure or a relief 

 from some sort of suffering. It has also been 

 observed that horses at all disposed to it may be 

 easily led into it by the practice of some men in 

 cleaning them; for if they clean them before the 

 manger and irritate them with a too severe comb, 

 and in parts where they can not endure it, they seize 

 upon the manger for a counteraction of their suffer- 

 ings, and in doing this first get a habit of it which 

 may afterward extend to the removing of other pains 

 or distressful feelings. Some horses indulge in the 

 habit of licking the manger and gnawing the wood- 

 work, which may eventually lead to cribbing. 



In practicing the vice cribbers avail themselves of 

 any prominent object even as small as a nail or a 

 ring, and in the absence of any protruding or promi- 

 nent object they will grasp the halter or bridle-rein. 

 Horses that simply practice the act of wind-sucking, 

 require no resting point. When horses first begin 

 to crib-bite, and sometimes inveterate crib-biters, 

 they only indulge in the practice at intervals, some 

 while eating and others while standing in the stable 

 without food before them. During attacks of pain- 



