88 MY HORSE ; MY LOVE 



The age of a horse is told quite distinctly by his teeth, 

 is it not? But I have never understood just how. 



*The young horse's teeth meet in the mouth, edge to 

 edge, being upright. Some horses are parrot-mouthed, so 

 that the upper teeth project somewhat, but the back ones 

 always meet squarely. As they grow older the teeth in 

 both jaws project more and more, making an acute angle, 

 until, at twenty years of age, the under sides meet together.' 



Ah, I see. Did you ever pull a horse's tooth ? 



' Never but once. The horse in this case had what are 

 called porcine teeth ; that is, four little tusks growing at the 

 sides of the mouth. As they were not attached to the 

 bone, I nipped them off promptly with the forceps with 

 little pain to the horse, who was greatly relieved to be rid 

 of them.' 



' Once I was called to come quickly to a horse supposed 

 to be suffering from lockjaw. After examination I could 

 assure his anxious owner that the trouble was a very trivial 

 one. A tooth in the upper jaw had broken off, and just 

 opposite to it, in the lower jaW; was a tooth projecting 

 nearly an inch above the others. When the horse closed 

 his mouth in eating, the projecting tooth fitted nicely into 

 the hollow of the broken tooth above, and became wedged 

 or locked.' 



The cure was very simple. I prised open his mouth with 

 a chisel, and filed off the long tooth, so that there was no 

 further danger of its locking — an operation which the horse 

 seemed to understand, and bore very patiently.' 



