8o MY HORSE ; MY LOVE 



suggest eyeglasses as a remedy. Many horses, especially 

 speedy hunters, would find such artificial assistance in- 

 valuable. So many are unfit for even ordinary work on 

 this account, that only a visit to the optician could prove 

 their one defect, and establish the fact that, but for it, 

 their value need be no less than that of their more for- 

 tunate companions with normal sight.' 



I have read lately that the oculists have made great 

 strides in curing defects of vision in man without the use 

 of glasses. Even eyes which have been dimmed from birth 

 by malformation have had the power to see well, without 

 glasses, restored by the best specialists. Many examples 

 were given as evidence, that errors of refraction were daily 

 cured by treatment, glasses being dispensed with. Dr W. 

 H. Bates, of New York City, concludes an excellent article 

 in the New York Medical Jojirtial, after recording many 

 cases cured of near sightedness, supposed to be irremedi- 

 able, in these words : ' The vision, in many cases of 

 myopia, can be improved very much by treatment without 

 glasses, and frequently this improvement is so marked as to 

 render glasses unnecessary.' Could this same treatment be 

 made successful in horses ? 



' Certainly, diseases in man and horse are very similar, 

 but such treatment of the eyes would be very expensive, 

 although probably not more so, than that of many other 

 infirmities. It might prove that the horse accused of vices, 

 such as shying, balking, swerving, etc., had none such from 

 inclination ; and that the sight, being promptly cured of its 

 defect, relieved the horse of such odium. Then if the 

 object about which a balking horse is in alarmed doubt can 

 be brought to him, or he can be coaxed to it, so that he 

 can see it closely, and can investigate it with his nose, in 



