74 NOTES FOE HUNTING-MEN 



I advise the following treatment : 



As soon as the hunting season is over, the owner 

 or stud groom should carefully examine each horse, 

 and should decide on what should be the immediate 

 treatment required in his case. Some will want 

 blistering or tiring. With them an enforced rest, 

 more or less prolonged, will be a necessity — good for 

 the injured limb, but bad for the horses' condition. 

 It is a choice of two evils. All the horses can be 

 gradually cooled down, and placed on a lower scale 

 of diet. Any that are going to be operated on 

 should have a dose of physic — four drams aloes 

 is plenty ; and the others will be none the worse for 

 a couple of pints of linseed oil, given on successive 

 nights, a pint at a time. Some grooms always 

 like to give every horse a dose of physic at this 

 time. There is no sense in it, unless a horse needs 

 sudden cooling down, or is looking stale or bad. 

 Then it is a good thing, often helping him to start 

 assimilating his food, and to get benefit from a 

 tonic, if you think fit to give him one. Anyhow, a 

 fortnight's rest, on quite laxative food, wdll not hurt 

 all your horses. Put them on this regime gradually, 

 and let 3^our man spend the fortnight's time mark- 

 ing any damages to horses, clothing, saddlery, &c. 

 This will bring him to about the last week in April. 

 If you have a handy paddock, and it is not a very 

 cold spring, those horses which have been blistered 



