MEDICAL TREATMENT OF DOMESTIC ANIMALS. 401 



" except that the animal should be sheltered from intense heat, 

 " and more particularly from wet." 



Concerning the practices of docking and nicking, which, until 

 recently, were almost universal, Herbert says : — 



" These barbarous methods of depriving the horse of his natural 

 " form and appearance, in order to make him conform to the 

 " fashion of the time, are, fortunately, very fast going into disuse. 

 " If the tail of the horse were given to him for no good purpose, 

 " and if it were not a design of nature that he should have the 

 " power of moving it forcibly to his sides, there might be some 

 " excuse for cutting it off, within a few inches of his body, or for 

 " separating the muscles at its sides to lessen this power ; but that 

 " this is not the case, must be acknowledged by all who have seen 

 " how a horse, whose tail has been abridged by ' docking,' or 

 " weakened by nicking, is annoyed by flies. 



" If a horse has a trick of throwing dirt on his rider's clothing, 

 "this may be prevented by cutting off the hair of the tail, below 

 " the end of the bones, as is the custom with hunters in England, 

 " where the hair is cut squarely ofF about eight or ten inches 

 " above the hocks. 



" No apology is offered for not giving in this work a description 

 " of these two operations ; they are so barbarous and so senseless, 

 " that they are going very rapidly out of fashion, and it is to be 

 " hoped that they will ere long have become obsolete, as has the 

 " cropping of the ears, formerly so common in England. 



" A more humane way of setting up the horse's tail, to 

 " give him a more stylish appearance, is by simply weighting it, 

 " for a {q-w hours each day, in the stall, until it attains the desired 

 " elevation. This is done by having two pulleys at the top of the 

 " stall, one at each side, through which are passed two ropes, 

 " which come together and are fastened to the tail, the ropes hav- 

 " ing at their other ends weights, (bags of sand or of shot are very 

 "good for the purpose,) which must be light at first, and may be 

 " increased from day to day. The weighting should be continued 

 "until the tail has taken a permanent position as desired. It is 

 " true that this method requires a somewhat longer time than that 



