CHAPTER V. 



WATER. 



04 — It is distressino- to think of the amount of discomfort 

 inflicted on the horse by the ignorance of his owners and keepers 

 on this simple sul>ject. " Water, water every wliere, and not a 

 drop to drink," must often be the inward cry of the poor, thirsty, 

 hard worked and dry fed horse. On his natural .«>Teen pasture 

 he could manage to exist some time without water, but compelled 

 sadly against his will to live on nothing but corn and dry hay, 

 how hard it must seem to him to be rushed through or past eacli 

 tempting stream, and to be scolded or kicked when he would gladly 

 di'ink the water in which his own dirty feet have been washed. 

 Thousands of grooms have lived and died under the impression 

 that their chief duty Avas to find out how little water a horse 

 could live on. For hundreds of years grooms have been taught 

 by the great diplomatised authorities, who are supposed to know 

 everything and never make any mistakes, that a hungry and 

 thirsty horse will get colic or inflammation of the bowels if 

 allowed to drink before he has eaten his corn. Now, these 

 same great authorities have just discovereil that the poor horse 

 must not have a drop of water immediately after he has eaten 

 his corn. 



By killing and looking inside some old horses that had 

 eaten a great feed of corn and had then swallowed a deluge of 

 water, they discovered that some of the corn had been washed 

 out of the stomach into the bowels before it was prepared to go 

 there. And although that is exactly the practice they have 

 recommended to every groom and horse keeper for hundreds of 

 years past they have now found out that is just what ought not 

 to be done. If these great authorities had gone to nature for 



