CONDITION OF HUNTERS RESUMED 319 



In the first place, it is impossible to keep a stable as 

 pure as the open air ; and, in the next, it is by no 

 means essential to a horse's health that it should be so, 

 or that he should be kept cool — on the contrary if a 

 hunter or race-horse. I maintain the contrary on 

 experience ; and affirm that a temperature of sixty- 

 two or sixty-three is almost essential to the perfect 

 condition of horses. Here, with respect to the race- 

 horse, I am backed by Mr Darvill in his treatise on 

 " Training the English Race-horse," who says that 

 thorough-bred horses, which have originated in a 

 hot climate, are not to be got into racing condition 

 unless kept in a stable of a certain temperature of 

 heat, which he estimates at sixty-three.^ 



Another writer on the diseases of horses says : 

 " The moment parturition is accomplished, the sub- 

 sequent existence of animals depends so much on 

 respiration that they enjoy health, activity, and 

 vigour, or become enfeebled, emaciated, and diseased, 

 according to the degree of purity or the state of 

 contamination of the atmosphere in which they 

 breathe. For it is to be observed that the air, in its 

 passage through the lungs, undergoes a decom- 

 position — the oxygen, or vital part, being absorbed 

 by the blood ; and with this fluid carried to every part 

 of the system, to which it imparts life and vigour. 



I have good reason to believe there is no vapour 

 which acts more offensively on the eye-sight than 



^ Mr Darvill properly observes there should be a thermometer 

 in every stable, which should be consulted before it is shut up at 

 night. 



