COACH HORSES. 349 



To show the effect of pace, it may not be amiss to 

 mention, that by calculations made as to the mean strength 

 of animals, a horse drawing horizontally and at the rate 

 of two miles and a half in an hour, can work for eight 

 hours in succession against the resistance of 200 lbs. 1 

 Quadruplicate that pace, and he would find an eighth 

 part of the time a very sufficient dose. Thus I contend 

 that we can pretty nearly measure a horse's power in 

 harness. 



Good hind legs and well-spread gaskins are very 

 essential points in a coach horse — the weight or force 

 applied proceeding from the fulcrum formed by the 

 hinder feet. Thus we see a waggon horse, when brought 

 to a dead pull, will sometimes not touch the ground at 

 all with his fore feet. I have a cart mare that will 

 prove this assertion any day in the year ; and to show 

 that horses draw by their weight, it frequently has hap- 

 pened that a horse has been unable to draw a cart out of 

 a slouo-h, until a sack of corn thrown on his back, when 

 he has had little difficulty in doing it. Exclusive of the 

 weight, this has in some degree the effect of increasing 

 the tension of the system, and tension is necessary to 

 motion. Thus it is, as I have before stated, that what 

 we call lobbing goers take more weight with them than 

 horses of better action. 



There is another reason why little horses are unfit 

 for heavy work. They will seldom walk and draw at 

 the same time ; for if they walk, they are catching at their 



1 One hundred and sixty pounds is the assumed power of a horse at 

 plough. 



