110 EXGLAXDS HORSES, 



certificate " with. But there are otliers notorious for not 

 only rejecting horses for the most trivial and unimportant 

 things, having nothing at all to do with soundness, but 

 filling up their certificates with observations not at all be- 

 longing to the province of a qualified and respectable 

 ^I.R.C.Y.S. What do we expect of a Veterinary Surgeon 

 when we ask his advice as to soundness ? What is his 

 duty in such case ? Simply, tliat he inspects the horse for 

 disease and lameness; and, if free from these, he is pro- 

 fessionally sound. Once the veterinary descends to ol)ser- 

 vations outside, or rather beneath his professional status, he 

 volunteers an office that neither duty or propriety demands 

 of him. If a gentleman, or tradesman, has had the trouble 

 of showing his horse, and submitting him to a trial more or 

 less arduous, and that he has sold him "subject to a Vet.'s 

 opinion," he ought to expect he is bringing his horse to 

 such establishments to be professionally examined for 

 disease, and not for the purpose of undergoing a second 

 overhauling for the very qualifications he has already satis- 

 fied the intending buyer about. But in notorious instances 

 the nuisance of this derogation from professional conduct 

 has become quite a standing grievance. This is a great 

 pity, for, no doul)t, the error is committed from over zeal 

 and not a desire for the pubJicity of a hypercritical character 

 that induces to large practice with intending purchasers. 



It is quite time that something like a rule, or a law, 

 should be come to upon the subject of soundness or un- 

 soundness in horses ; for while left an open question as to 

 what constitutes it, it is plain that opinion in many cases 

 will be varied according to the order of mind rather than, 

 the professional capacity of the inspectors ; and an indi- 

 vidual experience so varied, old, and practical as mine has 

 been, enables me to declare that if any given horse be 

 subjected to the professional inspection of four leading 



