GIVING BALLS, DEBILITY 193 



If your horses get ill, you naturally wish to know 

 the cause, and why they should be treated in 

 such a manner from a logical point of view. 

 This, then, is what amateur veterinary amounts 

 to, and it is inseparably bound up with profes- 

 sional veterinary, because the amateur is depen- 

 dent on the profession when in difficulties, and 

 the profession are dependent on the amateurs 

 for payment of services rendered, often under 

 exasperatingly difficult circumstances — a queru- 

 lous owner with a little smattering, a groom who 

 is doggedly discourteous if not flattered or tipped, 

 and a patient who is often badly nursed and 

 who is not treated at the most opportune 

 moment — for vets are often consulted when the 

 patient is at least half-dying, and when the 

 previous treatment, or ill-treatment, of the animal 

 has been suppressed. 



More — ah, far more — than 30 per cent, of 

 equine diseases are due to crass stupidity, 

 verging on unwarrantable cruelty — over-strain- 

 ing, thereby causing the heart to be strained, 

 likewise the wind, spavins, and splints. Over- 

 heated stables are likewise a ready source of 

 disease. Ill-kept stables, bad grooming, bad 

 feeding ; in fact, bad anything, such as bad 

 management causing colds, all help to make 

 patients for the amateur vet to diagnose the 

 symptoms as best he can. And for the profes- 

 sional vet to cure when the bad amateur has 

 made a mull of things — to use a school-boy's 

 phrase. 



Hereditary diseases are very common, more 



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