To Tell the Age of Horses. 223 



The age of all horses, except thoroughbred^ are 

 reckoned from May. 



The '^mark''^ in the tooth is occasioned by the 

 food blackening the hollow pit which is formed 

 on their surface by the bending in of the enamel, 

 which passes over the teeth ; and by the gradual 

 wearing down of the enamel by friction we are 

 enabled to tell the age of the horse up to seven 

 years. In the third year the tusks sometimes 

 begin to appear, although in some instances they 

 do not appear until five or six years ; but the 

 most general time for their appearance is in the 

 fourth year. But little dependence can be placed 

 on the tusk of the horse to determine its age. 

 Mares seldom have tusks. In Fig. 5 it will be 

 seen that in the three-year-old mouth, the central 

 teeth are larger than the others, and are provided 

 with two grooves in the outer convex surface. 

 The mark is long, narrow, deep, and black ; and 

 these teeth not having attained their full growth 

 are somewhat lower than the others. In the 

 two next the mark is nearly worn out, and in 

 the corner teeth it is slowly disappearing. At 

 this period it is not unusual for dealers to '' york " 

 a colt, that is, if they have a colt that has been 

 foaled early, they punch out the central nippers, 

 and the others appear some months sooner than 

 they otherwise would ; this allows the teeth to 

 rise much quicker than they would do naturally, 

 and enables them to sell the horse for twelve 

 months older than it really is. 



At four years old the central nippers will have 

 attained their full size, and the sharp edge which 



