THE PROCESS OF TEETHING. 



'49 



In the next incisors the mark is shorter, broader, and fainter; and in the corner teetn 

 the edges of the enamel are more rea^ular, and the surface is evidently worn. The 

 tush has attained its full growth, being nearly or quite an inch in length ; convex out- 

 ward, concave within; tending to a point, and the extremity somewhat curved. The 

 third grinder is fcurly up ; and all the grinders are level. 



The horse may now be said to have a perfect mouth. All the teeth are produced, 

 fully grown, and have hitherto sustained no material injury. During these important 

 changes of the teeth, the animal has sufiered less than could be supposed possible. 

 In children, the j)eriod of teething is fraught v/ith danger. Dogs are subject to con- 

 vulsions, and hundreds of them die, from the irritation caused by the cutting or shed- 

 ding of their teeth ; but the horse appears to 

 feel little inconvenience. The gums and palate 

 are occasionally somewhat hot and swollen ; 

 but the sliglitest scarification will remove this. 

 The teeth of the horse are more necjessary to 

 him than those of the other animals are to 

 them. The child may be fed, and the dog 

 will bolt his food ; but that of the horse must 

 be well ground down, or the nutriment cannot 

 be extracted from it. 



At seven years, the marlc, in the way in 

 which we have described it, is worn out in 

 the four central nippers, and fast wearing 

 away in the corner teeth ; the tush also is 

 beginning to be altered. It is rounded at the 

 point; rounded at the edges; still round without; and beginning to get round inside. 

 At eight years old, the tnsh is rounder in every way; the mark is gone from all the 

 bottom nippers, and it may almost be said to be out of the mouth. There is nothing 

 remaining in the bottom nippers that can afterwards clearly show the age of the horse, 

 or justify the most experienced examiner in giving a positive opinion. 



Dishonest dealers have been said to resort to a method of prolonging the mark in 

 the lower nippers. It is called bishopiiig, from the name of the scoundrel who invented 



it. The horse of eight or nine years old is 

 thrown, and with an engraver's tool a hole 

 is dug in the now almost plain surface of the 

 corner teeth, and in shape and depth resem- 

 bling the mark in a seven-years-old horse. 

 The hole is then burned with a heated iron, 

 and a permanent black stain is left. The 

 next pair of nippers are sometimes lightly 

 touched. An ignorant man would be very 

 ,^?[ easily imposed on by this trick : but the 



^^^ irregular appearance of the cavity — the diffu- 



sion of the black stain around the tushes, the 

 "W" sharpened edges and concave inner surface 

 ',/ of which can never be given again — the 

 marks on the upper nippers, together with 

 the general conformation of the horse, can never deceive the careful examiner. 



Horsemen, after the animal is eight years old, are accustomed to look to the nippers 

 in the upper jaw, and some conclusion has been drawn from the appearances which 

 they present. It cannot be doubted that the mark remains in them for some years 

 after it has been obliterated from the nippers in the lower jaw ; because the hard sub- 

 stance, or kind of cement, by which the pit, or funnel, in the centre of the tooth is 

 occupied, does not reach so high, and there is a greater depth of tooth to be worn 

 away, in order to come at it. To this, it may be added that the upper nippers are not 

 so much exposed to friction and wear as the under. The lower jaw alone is moved, 

 and pressed forcibly upon the food : the upper jaw is without motion, and has only to 

 resist that pressure. 



There are various opinions as to the intervals between the disappearance of the 

 13* 



