250 ROAD, TRACK, AND STABLE. 



ery driver has his own specific, upon the peculiar and 

 wonderful properties of which he will descant with 

 much enthusiasm ; but the best of them is probably 

 not more efficacious than a rag tied about the coronet, 

 and kept well moistened with cold water. 



Despite the severity of their occasional labors and 

 the hard usage to which their feet are subjected, fire 

 horses in Boston last a considerable time. They are 

 bought, usually, at the age of five or six years (cost- 

 ing about $325), and they remain in service, on the 

 average, about seven or eight years. In other cities 

 their duration and cost are nearly the same. In Cam- 

 bridge, where few of the streets are paved, fire horses 

 are said to last from seven to ten years ; but in Brook- 

 lyn this period is put as low as six years, — about the 

 length of time that a car horse endures. 



In Boston there are at least half a dozen veterans 

 of ten years' standing, and some who have served as 

 fire horses even longer than that. The old hose-cart 

 horse of whom I have spoken already has a record 

 of at least ten years' service. There is another sea- 

 soned Houyhnhnm, — a dark chestnut, of the same 

 heavy, low-standing shape, who has seen twelve win- 

 ters in the business. About five years ago it was 

 thought that he ought to have an easier life, and ac- 

 cordingly he was transferred to an outlying station, 

 where fires seldom occur. But on the occasion of the 

 first alarm to which he responded the old fellow bolt- 

 ed, and made a complete wreck of the hose-cart by 

 dashing it against a stone wall. This was his protest 

 at being removed from the house to which he had 

 become accustomed, and from the society of his fa- 

 miliar friends, human and equine ; and so he was put 



