COMMON AILMENTS. 27 



hair is dry and chippy ; there is generally a harsh, discordant 

 cough, and the appetite increases very much. Worms are of 

 three or four kinds, but the treatment, roughly speaking, is 

 the same for all. A ball made of aloes, with a small quantity 

 of oil of wormwood added, should be given, and an injection 

 of linseed oil used. One species of worm (the long round 

 worm) is sometimes voided in large quantities by quite healthy 

 horses, and my experience has gone to show that they are, 

 in many cases, perfectly harmless. Indeed, the last case 

 I came across was that of a carriage-horse which had never 

 been sick nor sorry in his life, carried a smooth coat, and 

 was as fat as a mole. Yet I saw scores of these worms 

 (some Gin. long) come away from him in a single morning. 



Washiness. — This is mostly caused by indigestion, though 

 in some animals a peculiarly excitable disposition may be 

 responsible for it. There is great irritation of the stomach, 

 and the food passes too quickly through. The consequence 

 is that the horse, instead of deriving the proper amount of 

 nutriment from its corn, gets thin and halt-starved looking 

 Physic is no good here ; you must rely entirely upon a course 

 of dieting. Boiled linseed, mixed with a bran-mash, carrots, 

 Mnd demulcent drinks, such as flour or oatmeal gruel, will be 

 found of great service, and the oats should be crushed ; in 

 this form they are more likely to remain in the stomach until 

 some nutriment, at least, is extracted. If circumstances permit, 

 there is nothing so good as a long run at grass, always 

 provided the horse has no access to herbage of a marshy 

 nature, which will do infinitely more harm than good. 



Cracked Heels. — The horse will not be long in showing you 

 what is the matter with it here. It will lift one hind leg to 

 such a height as to frequently fall against the side of the stall ; 

 occasionally it will utterly decline to " come over " when being 

 bedded down, &c. ; the legs will swell up, and a considerable 

 amount of heat will be found in them, most of it in the heel. 

 The skin is hard, glossy, and red, whilst the cracks themselves 

 vary very much in size and soreness. Where the cracks are 

 deep, accompanied by considerable lameness, the first thing 

 to do will be to gently foment the part with warm water, and 

 then apply a poultice, made of equal parts bran and linseed, 

 or linseed alone. The best way to do this is to pull a stocking 

 right over the foot and half way up the leg ; then fill it with 

 the poultice, pushing the linseed well into the sore parts, and 



