50 THE POCKET AND THE STUD. 



abundant ventilation when required ; for, in fact, 

 even in the severest weather, ventilation is indis- 

 pensable : it is in this particular, more than any 

 other, where the healthfulness of stables usually 

 falls short of what it should be ; however warm a 

 stable may be, it should be perfectly dry. The 

 moment anything like steam is seen hanging 

 about, that stable is unhealthy, and colds and de- 

 bility, with all their concomitant evils, follow as 

 sure as night follows day. Many a first-rate 

 stable have I entered in the morning, when even 

 the clothes on the horses' backs felt damp, the 

 walls and windows, of course, streaming with 

 water. To speak to a groom on the consequences 

 of permitting this to continue would be words 

 thrown away ; he will fancy it keeps his horses 

 fine in their coats, while the fact is, it has a di- 

 rectly opposite tendency it produces debility 

 and ill health, and if horses so circumstanced can 

 look blooming in their coats, they must be made 

 of different materials from any that I ever had 

 to do with. It may be that while horses are in 

 this pest-house, and consequently are in a state 

 of comparative perspiration, their coats may stick 

 to. their skins. So they would if they came out of 

 a warm-bath. But take them'into the air : if their 

 coats do not stand on end, and thus let every par- 

 ticle of cold wind on to their skins, I am much 

 mistaken. The coachman or groom, on seeing 

 this, will say perhaps " You see now what bring- 



