PREFACE 



In the little volume now submitted to the public, I have 

 endeavoured, without attempting to interfere with the legiti- 

 mate functions of the veterinary surgeon — to whom recourse 

 must always be had in serious cases — to indicate the course 

 of treatment to be pursued in most of the ordinary ailments 

 that horseflesh is heir to, and to offer such suggestions as 

 may save the amateur horse-keeper the expense of a " doctor's 

 bill " when the trouble which afflicts his charge is one of a 

 common-place, or, at all events, of a not unusual description. 

 I can, at least, claim that what I have written emanates 

 strictly from a twenty years' practical — not theoretical — 

 experience amongst all classes of horses, and especially with 

 hunters and steeplechasers, which, by reason of their several 

 vocations, are peculiarly liable to accident, if not to disease. 



In treatment of every description, it cannot be too strongly 

 borne in mind that Nature's tendency is invariably to heal, 

 and it is very often sufficient for man to prepare the con- 

 ditions under which she can most favourably act. In the 

 third chapter I have ventured to deprecate any non-profes- 

 sional interference in the case of fractures and dislocations, and 

 this should be very earnestly insisted on. Speaking generally, 

 when once a horse has broken a bone, nothing remains but 

 to put him out of his misery without a moment's unnecessary 

 delay, unless, indeed, he or she be valuable for stud purposes, 



