LEADING LEG. FOUNDER. GROGGY. K> 



Vfind" (keeping the lungs filled) during the girthing; a fine proof this of Na- 

 ture's dealinffs, for whicli they usually either get kicked under the belly, or 

 hit about the head ; but both kinds of punishment are the harbingers of further 

 disease, viz. the first of the blind gut, as descrilx'd at Section 48 and 49 ; and 

 the other leads to poll evil, as described in Book 2. 



A horse is frequently found to have contracted lameness in the forc-ieg 

 without showing any visible sign of its exact situation, and applications to the 

 shoulder is the usual remedy in the hands of the generality of common far- 

 riers. Some of them imagine the strain is situated lower in the leg ; but they 

 are no nearer the fact, though they are to the spot. A defect in the conforma- 

 tion of the limbs occasions the foot which leads to come upon the ground with 

 more force than its fellow : the concussion of the hoof is greater, and is un- 

 equally placed when the leg is a-twist than in the upright form ; the loading 

 tires sooner, and the sensible sole becomes inflamed when the horse is con- 

 stantly urged to step out with it, the atHiction barely showing itself between 

 the frog and the toe, if any where. If a horse receives the impulse to {)roceed 

 from the right hand or heel, he will step out with the fore-leg of that side, ac- 

 companied by the hind-leg of the near side; but his rider, or driver, should 

 early teach him to change the leading-leg, by sometimes touching him upon 

 the contrary side. It is worthy of note, too, that the horse which executes 

 this change with the least trouble, and oftenest, has most power and command 

 of his limbs. [See Index — Fever in the feet.] When both legs before are at- 

 tacked, the horse exhibits a crippling uncertain gait, not unlike that of a 

 drunken man, whence the term "groggy" has lieen applied, and, if he is not 

 timely indulged in rest and a run at grass, he is a ruined horse, and liccomes 

 soon what is termed "foundered," of which disorder there are several kinds. 

 The mistaking one kind of founder for another generally costs the animal his 

 life, sooner or later, and the studious inquirer had better turn to the next 

 Chapter (at sect. 21. paragraph 3), where he will find a few words on chest 

 founder, many of the symptoms whereof are not unlike this of the feet. 



Horses full of feed, and requiring purgative physic, stand with the legs 

 stretched, more than our second cut, at page 7, — inordinately at times. Old 

 Gibson attributed it to vice, and a disposition to kick, when a horse holds his 

 toe scarcely resting on the ground ; this is not always the case, for his fore- 

 leg is as frequently so held a-trip a3 his hind one ; and I consider it the token 

 alike of either sore feet, or of incipient founder. 



12. Besides the disproportion the fore and hind legs bear to each other, 

 another series of defects in construction exists between the length of the fore 

 limbs and that of the trunk, being sometimes- most apparent at the btlly and 

 flank, at others on the back, its tendency always depending on the turn taken 

 by the latter. Although this is the old English way of judging of long car- 

 cased horses, Lafosse (an old French farrier) took the measure of proportions 

 more properly from the breast-bone to the buttock, in the annexed plate being 

 from the parallel line 11 to 38; then comparing this with his height, he tells 

 us "a good horse, as we can learn from experience, should be a tenth longer 

 from the breast to the buttock than he is high from the top of the shoulder to 

 the ground." The latter admeasurement will be found upon the annexed 

 plate to extend from the line [D to Z] and, with the former, will compose a 

 gquare rather wider than high, — the integuments being removed from the 

 bones on all sides. My notions of just proportion, however, differ from the 

 French standard, though they do not run into the contrary extreme ; for I can 

 not help thinking inordinate length of body, as compared to a horse's height, 

 a very great defect as regards his health, that form being invariably attended 

 with meagre, washy flanKs, and a painful manner of going. But the Fiao- 



