Drawing Horses. 83 



illustrate constantly recurring subjects at so much a page, 

 can scarcely escape becoming ' mannered ' in his mode of 

 pictorial expression. It is futile under the ordinary conditions 

 of such commercial contracts to expect that he should or could 

 make separate studies of the particular animals, which alone 

 could enable him to give individuality to each of them. 

 Hence, with the best intentions in the world, he gradually 

 adopts the suicidal method of tracing his horses according to 

 his mental stencil plate, instead of drawing their actual 

 portraits. Then, again, what tricks that mischievous imp, 

 imagination, plays with many artists who illustrate periodical 

 literature. While leading the draughtsman down the smooth 

 slopes of its own domain, it deprives him little by little of 

 the ability of seeing things as they are, until at last 

 his drawings are all on one plane, without any * guts/ 

 as picture - dealer term the rendering of the different 

 ' values.' 



After leaving Edinburgh, I stayed a short time in Cam- 

 bridge, ' cramming ' militia subalterns for the army, and then 

 went on to Newmarket. I may explain that my reasons for 

 going in regularly to become a member of the R.C.V.S., was 

 to improve my knowledge and to strengthen, in the eyes of 

 the public, my writings on horse subjects, and especially on 

 veterinary matters. I arrived in Newmarket, full of a book I 

 had in my head about equine conformation, or, to use a popular 

 expression, the make and shape of horses, which had always 

 been a subject of deep interest to me. I had, however, made 

 no progress in it ; for I could find no teacher, either oral or 

 printed, from whom I could obtain satisfying instruction. 

 Although I had a fair share of practical experience, I was 

 utterly ignorant of the true principles of the science, and con- 

 sequently did not attach any importance to them. I had 

 waded through the literature of the subject without much 

 benefit. The English books, such as those of Percival, 

 Carson, Stonehenge and Fitzwygram, had no ' why ? ' in 

 them at all. Bourgelat, Merche and Lecoq were better in 



