420 OF STRAW, ITS VALUE, AND USES. 



cloth might be fixed by tacks, if considered to be necessary.* 

 I am convinced, that horses are much the worse for stand- 

 ing on hot litter, which brings down the humours to the 

 feet, and occasions grease, unless when the dung is re- 

 gularJy removed.f A horse also, accustomed to stand 

 on so soft a material as litter, must be more apt to suf- 

 fer, when he gets on hard roads, than if he stood on 

 boards. Nor is litter necessary for cattle. In a distillery 

 at Battersea, near London, stalls were erected to feed 500 

 cattle at a time ; they both stood and lay on a framing, 

 (a kind of trellis), of wood-work, raised a little above the 

 pavement, and they were not allowed straw, or any sub- 

 stitute for it, as bedding. J It is also said that horses lie 

 on boards in some parts of Sweden. 



2. The principal advantage of littering, therefore, arises 

 from the straw absorbing the urine, for which it is a ma- 

 terial certainly well calculated. But wherever straw is 

 scarce or dear, for the mere absorption of urine, peat earth, 

 or fine mould, might be advantageously employed, at least 

 in aid of the other ; and if horses and cattle were to stand 

 on platforms, with holes in the boards on which they stood, 



* I am informed, that the late Mr Wedderburn of Birkhill, in Fife, 

 owing to the high price of straw, was induced to try the experiment of 

 keeping his riding-horses on boards, grooved so that the urine might run 

 from, under them ; and that he fouud this plan to answer preferable to 

 litter, the horses suffered no inconvenience, but, on the contrary, rather 

 improved in their coat. Others conceive it impossible, that rest can be 

 obtained equally well on boards, as on good straw. Rest, it is said, in 

 the best possible manner, is peculiarly necessary for horses, owing to tlie 

 severe labour to which they are subjected. 



t It is said, What horses have cleaner limbs, or are better littered, 

 than the English hunters and racers ? But then they are well curried!, 

 and carefully attended to. 



J Middlesex Report, p. 328. Ditto, p, 364. 



