POOD AND GENERAL TREATMENT. 403 



all the modifications of his circumstances and suiroundings; 

 and to learn the laws bearing upon this subject should be the 

 study, as it certainly is the interest, of all owners of the 

 horse every- where. It will be our object, in this chapter, to 

 throw what light we can upon these important matters, and 

 to present a few plain and practical directions in regard to 

 the best methods to be pursued. 



There are two conditions, already adverted to, in which the 

 horse demands stronger feed, and more of it, than any others — 

 hard service and cold weather. In the spring season, !N^a- 

 ture, that has wrapped herself for months in a covering of 

 snow to resist the severities of winter, now throws off her 

 mantle, and undergoes a change throughout her entire ma- 

 terial organism. Her law, in this regard, is universal, and 

 nothing is more plainly subject to and affected by it than 

 the horse. His coat is shed, his skin changed, his blood 

 thinned, and his digestion altered to some extent. His stom- 

 ach will not digest, neither does his body req^uire, the food 

 that was needed during the cold of winter. That season, 

 with itb; pressing demands upon the vital energies, has gone ; 

 the frame has now relaxed, and less food, and milder, will 

 meet all -the animal's wants, under the gentle influence of 

 spring. All Nature has been dead and dry for nearly half a 

 year ; and the body that has been fortifying itself with stimu- 

 lating food and warm clothing, with thickened skin and a 

 denser coat of hair, to meet the rigors and exactions of 

 winter, now needs no longer the concentrated substances of 

 the dry food and strong diet. 



But while the body has thus been changing, in harmony 

 with Nature, so that it now requires other food, Nature has 

 been at work preparing for this very emergency. It is the 

 Creator's own beneficient provision, for the health and com- 

 fort of the brute creation, that he has clothed the fields with 

 verdure, and there is nothing so pleasant or healthful to the 

 horse as the pasture. 



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