THE CARE OF HORSES. 289 



out of ten — forty-nine out of fifty, I think I might 

 say — this precaution is unnecessary. In straight 

 stalls I tie my horses so that they can rest their 

 heads flat on the floor, and I have never had one 

 injured by so doing. In many stables, if an animal 

 is seen to lie down in the daytime, it is at once con- 

 cluded that he must be ill. But give a horse bedding 

 and sufficient halter rope, and it will soon become 

 habitual with him to lie down for a part of the day 

 as well as of the night. I have noticed especially 

 that horses like to recline in the morning, after they 

 have finished eating, comfortably snoozing while they 

 digest their breakfast. Horses that are out of the 

 stable all day, such as cart and hack horses, should 

 always have their hay at night on the floor of the 

 stall, in order that the}? - may eat and lie down at the 

 same time. This plan, as we have seen, is usually 

 pursued with fire horses, and its advantages are plain. 

 The disadvantage of the method is that it would, in 

 some cases, entail a waste of fodder, but the waste 

 would be slight. 



I do not quite share the modern prejudice against 

 the old-fashioned hay-rack. It is dangerous, the au- 

 thorities say, because hay-seeds are likely to fall from 

 it into the animal's eyes. This may be so, but I 

 never heard or read of any such actual case. The 

 disadvantage of a hay-rack placed on the floor is 

 that the horse can eat from it easily and quickly : 

 whereas with the high hay-rack, protected by numer- 

 ous bars, he has some little difficulty in pulling out 

 his fodder, and hence will be longer in consuming it, 

 thus facilitating digestion, and giving him something 

 to do. The best arrangement, it seems to me, would 



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