8o THE CONDITION OF HUNTERS 



Having laid some stress upon the words, proper 

 allowance of hay and water on the day before hunting, 

 I will proceed to state what I consider that allowance 

 to be. In the first place, if a horse will eat his com 

 in the morning without water, he should have none 

 till he comes in from exercise, and is done up, which 

 should be by ten o'clock at farthest. He should then 

 have half a pail of water,i and a proportion of his 

 hay, which should not exceed, for a moderately- 

 sized horse, ten pounds a-day. He should then be 

 shut up till four, when, before he is dressed over, he 

 should have another half pail of water, and no more 

 until he returns from hunting the next day, unless it 

 be a few swallows on the morning he hunts, when his 

 groom first comes to him. If this quantity of hay is 

 not sufficient to satisfy his appetite, and there is an 

 appearance in the mornng of straw in his manger, as 

 if he had been eating it, the setting-muzzle should 

 be put on him at ten o'clock, and he should remain 

 on it for the night, but his groom should be with him 

 by five in the morning, to relieve him. He should 

 then have his two feeds, at an interval of an hour, 

 and proceed to the covert at a gentle pace. When 

 there — provided he have been treated in the way I 

 have prescribed and he cannot carry his rider as he 

 ought to do, we must conclude nature forbids it, as 

 he wiU have had every assistance from art. 



Long days with hounds — by which I mean severe 



^ On days not preceding hunting this quantity of water is not 

 sufficient. He may have three-parts of a pail in the morning, or a 

 few swallows at night. 



