150 THE HORSE. 



variably observe him laying the heel to the ground 

 first ; but the infant, whose muscular power is insig- 

 nificant, frequently uses its toes for a time before it can 

 deposit the heel ; and the very old man, who has lost 

 his action, or the man who is suddenly cut down with 

 severe illness, shuffles along the ground, and lays either 

 his toes or the flat of his foot to the surface of the road. 

 So is it with the horse. If we examine one which 

 evidently brings his toe first to the ground, we -will find 

 that he is either over- weighted in di'aught, or is so much 

 the worse of wear as to be nearly done, or that his form 

 was originally bad, and his muscular power defective. 

 On the other hand, I have seen hundreds of examples 

 in which the horse brought his heel quite perceptibly 

 first to the ground, and yet had a most powerful, active, 

 energetic, light, safe, and corkey action. A horse of 

 this kind, notwithstanding Mr. Dyer's opinion to the 

 contrary, will stand an immense amount of wear. One 

 of the greatest trotting horses I ever possessed, or in- 

 deed ever saw, was exactly of this description. There 

 was no mistake about his laying the heel first to the 

 ground ; a half-blind man could not miss observing it ; 

 and yet, although he got an immense amount of work 

 on the road, as all trotters will, as well as in his early 

 day in the field, his fore-feet and legs were as sound at 

 thirty-one years of age as when he was foaled. He 



