62 THE HOUSE BOOK. 



of the way in either direction. An extra $5 per 

 foal paid for practically doubles the profit. It 

 is plain that with a $15 fee the limit, no man 

 can afford to buy a very good stallion, for such 

 cannot be bought, as values now range at least, 

 for $1,500 or less. The stallion fee business is 

 one in which it will pay the mare owners well 

 to let the other fellow make a dollar once in a 

 while. 



There is something wrong with this stallion 

 fee business anyway, and there always has been. 

 The service fee has from time immemorial been 

 about the last thing the average farmer has 

 thought of paying. It seems to be a prevailing 

 impression that the fee is "easy money, " and 

 therefore the bill for it deserving of scant con- 

 sideration. Then in their far too fierce compe- 

 tition stallion men have let their bills run and 

 run along till most of them have lost a lot of 

 money through their good nature. In fact, it is 

 the exception to find a stallion owner conduct 

 his business on business principles. Insuring 

 the foal to stand and suck, as a business propo- 

 sition, is something no other variety of com- 

 merce would tolerate. In so doing the stallion 

 owner insures not only the proper treatment 

 of the mare and against the incidents and acci- 

 dents of parturition, but also against battle, 

 murder, sudden death, violence and pestilence as 

 well as the slight pathological disarrangement of 

 the fetal membranes through which, as already 



