56 STABLING OF HORSES. 



walk, in order to crop the heritage on which he exists ; 

 when under human protection, he changes a hfe of cease- 

 less activity for one of all but continuous stagnation. Is 

 it to be wondered then that the sinews often fail ? Or is 

 it a cause of complaint against nature, that the feet and 

 legs so often oblige man to allow his wretched servant to 

 remain idle ? The foot is the most valuable part of the 

 horse ; but, to preserve the foot, continued motion is im- 

 perative. This is denied ; a condition the very contrary is 

 enforced ; and then man, in his presumption, blames nature 

 because the foot of the horse is so often the seat of disease. 



Loose boxes are better than stalls. But in these the 

 injury is only lessened, not removed. The horse has a 

 loving heart bestowed upon him. He must love something. 

 Lambs, dogs, cats, goats, fowls, &c., every creature he is 

 permitted to see, by turns have become the object of his 

 affections. Mr. Blaine records, that horses have defeated 

 the utmost efforts of man to get them into condition when 

 a companion has been taken away from the next stall, or 

 when the animal has been stabled alone. Bales, after the 

 fashion of military stables, are to be preferred to wooden 

 partitions, unless they be made much lower than at present. 

 The stall should be made a few feet wider than is the custom 

 to build it. The floor should slant from behind towards 

 the middle, where the gutter may be placed, and then be 

 gently raised and afterwards incline towards the manger. 

 A notion is abroad, that the present flooring carries off the 

 urine of the mare, but were stables paved in the manner 

 we advocate, they would equally carry off the urine of 

 geldings. The point in dispute is surely, then, in our 

 favour. 



Most stables, moreover, are kept much too warm. Not 

 that any are heated by means of a stove or fire, but the 

 animals doomed to reside within them are made to breathe 

 the same air over and over again, until it becomes hot, and 

 smells so strongly of ammonia, as to sting the eyes and take 

 away the breath of the stranger who unexpectedly enters 

 them. This is not warmth ; but foulness, filth, and abomi- 

 nation, which should immediately be abjured. Let a stable 

 be freely ventilated ; it cannot have too nmch air at any 

 period of the year ; its inhabitants and the shelter of the 



