THE HACKNEY.] 



THE HOESE, AND 



[the hackney. 



giving him an hour's walking exercise as usual. 

 I should then give him two doses of physic, 

 which would not only cool his habit of body, 

 so as to prevent the danger of iuflamraatory 

 attacks, but would have such an effect on his 

 legs as would enable me to see what injury had 

 been done to them in his work, whether there 

 were any ligamentary enlargements, any injury 

 to the joints or sinews, any callous substances 

 produced by blows; or, in short, anything 

 going wrong. The clear state of his legs, 

 which this treatment will produce, would pre- 

 vent the possibility of working in the dark, as 

 they will become prior — to use the language of 

 grooms — in three weeks, than they would at 

 the expiration of three months' run at grass in 

 the summer." Mr. Appleby, however, further 

 observes, that, under favourable circumstances, 

 he would strongly recommend turning out. 

 " In case of having recourse to blistering, it is 

 most serviceable ; and, after spring, almost 

 necessary; but then the hunter should be 

 turned out only at night, and into a place 

 •where there is but little grass, and have two, 

 if not three feeds of corn a-day ; but nothing 

 else to eat till he goes out, unless it be a few 

 vetches, for four or five days at a time, when 

 they are young and tender, in the months of 

 May or June ; but these should not be repeated 

 more than three or four times, as they tend to 

 make horses very foul ; and when in pod are 

 most injurious to them." 



When we come to speak of the economy of 

 the stable, we wdl also treat of the manage- 

 ment of the hunter. 



THE HACKNEY. 



A Hack, in the modern stable phrase, signi- 

 fies a road horse, and not merely a horse let 

 out to hire, as some of the uninitiated suppose. 



The road horse is more difficult to meet with 

 in perfection than even the hunter or the 

 courser. There are many reasons for this. 

 The price of the hackney, or the horse of all 

 work, is so low, that he who has a good one, 

 will not part with him ; and it is by mere 

 accident that he can be obtained. There are 

 also several faults which may be overlooked in 

 the hunter, but which the road horse must 

 not have. The hunter may start, may be 

 awkward in his walk, or even his trot ; he 

 may have thrushes or corns ; but if he can go 

 92 



a good slapping pace, and has wind and bottom, 

 he can both be ^w< up loith and prized; but 

 the hackney, if he be worth having, must have 

 good fore-legs, and good hinder ones too ; he 

 must be sound on his feet, even tempered, no 

 starter, quiet in whatever situation he may be 

 placed, not heavy in hand, and never disposed 

 to tumble down. 



The hackney, like the hunter of the present 

 day, is always a horse with some portion of 

 racing blood; the whole English race, even to the 

 cart-horse, being more or less imbued, and 

 equally improved by it. Thus our road horses 

 are half, three parts, seven-eighths, or thorough- 

 bred. The two latter degrees are, in several 

 respects, not so well fitted for the purpose 

 of travelling as the former : chiefly on ac- 

 count of the tenderness of their less and 

 feet, their longer stride, and straight-kneed 

 action, not so well adapted to the English road 

 pace, the trot. Nevertheless bred hackneys 

 are elegant and fiishionable, and, when good 

 canterers, pleasant to ride ; insomuch, that a 

 certain colonel of the guards of former days, 

 insisted there was the same difference to be 

 felt in riding a bred hack and one without 

 blood, as between riding in a coach and in a 

 cart. One good property in thorough-bred 

 road horses is, that they seldom shy — many of 

 them never. 



The road horse should have a considerable, 

 lofty, yet light fore-hand or crest ; a deep and ex- 

 tensive shoulder ; be well raised at the withers ; 

 straight backed, and have substantial loins and 

 wide fillets, the croup not suddenly drooping, 

 nor the tail set on low. The head should not be 

 thick and fleshy, nor join abruptly to the neck, 

 but in a gradual or tapering form ; the eye full, 

 clear, and diaphanous. The fore-arms and 

 thighs, with plenty of muscular substance, 

 should be of reasonable length, but the legs 

 should, at no rate, be long. Much solid flat 

 bone beneath the knee, is a great perfection in 

 a hackney ; and the feet, standing straight, 

 turning neither inwards nor outwards, should 

 be of tough, dark, shining horn, and the heels 

 wide and open. The saddle-horse's fore-feet 

 should closely approach each other, the wide 

 chest being rather adapted to the collar. Not- 

 withstanding this near approximation of the 

 fore-feet, no apprehension need be entertained 

 of the horse's cutting himself in speed, or 



