160 UNASKED ADVICE. 



years after the accident. An odd case of injury 

 to the back occurred to the horse of a friend of mine ; 

 a lot of hay trusses was dropped on to his back from a 

 loft window. He was obviously damaged, but recovered 

 so as to hunt again ; but paralysis came on a year after, 

 and he had to be destroyed. Affections of the kidneys 

 often cause a horse to move as if his back was damaged, 

 but professional advice should be sought in all such cases. 

 The common run of grooms are very fond of ascribing 

 every abnormal movement to an injured back. I heard a 

 sapient specimen suggesting, some little time ago, that 

 the back was injured, of a horse who was rolling about 

 rather oddly in single harness. The fact was, the creature 

 was very groggy in both fore feet, which anyone of 

 common knowledge could see ; and this caused him to go, 

 as it were, one pace in front, and another behind the 

 result being that he rolled about, and persuaded this 

 ignoramus that his spine was damaged. Other fractures 

 are luckily rare. Broken ribs have, I believe, reunited, 

 but I have never seen a case. A fractured skull is not an 

 accident that anyone would expect to happen, yet I have 

 known two cases, and both victims were hunters. One 

 got loose after a fall, or at exercise I am not quite sure 

 which, as I did not see it, and it is long ago ; she ran her 

 head against a bough of a tree, and was killed. The 

 other was a hunter, who was being led through a low 

 archway ; being excited, he threw up his head, struck the 

 brickwork, and perished. Curbs are unmistakably the 

 property of hunters and racehorses, but more instances 

 happen in the hunting than in the training stable. Many 

 men who know a thing or two think but little of them, 

 and I must confess I have never known a horse perma- 

 nently lamed by one, though they often are lame for a 



