'i^HYSIC. 



81 



Now, creatures imprisoned ia such a building are actually perishing 

 of starvation I The food, the water, and the medical attendance may- 

 each of its kind be unexceptionable ; but the animals housed in such a 

 locality soon droop from positive inanition. To breathe, is the primary 

 necessity of existence. There is no living thing that can thrive where 

 air is excluded. The quadrupeds represented below have to pass twenty- 

 two out of every twenty -four hours in a locality barely lofty enough for 

 each to stand upright in. Let the reader, knowing the duration of cap- 

 tivity, conjecture how long it will be ere the huge lungs of a horse have 

 inhaled and contaminated the limited amount of atmosphere which the 

 place can contain, even were such an abode contemplated as the dwell- 

 ing of a single subject. 



BLISTERING A STABLEFUL Of OMNIBUS HORSES. 



It is true, such sheds are seldom air tight. Were all draughts excluded, 

 the prisoners would speedily be released from their captivity ; but the 

 wind holes, though large enough to prolong misery, are too small to 

 render such places the abodes of health. The wretched inmates cannqt 

 be tortured into a show of activity. When will the legislature, in its 

 wisdom, notice these hot-beds of contagion ? When will it empower the 

 police officer to enter any stable and authorize him to destroy the animals 

 therein, hopelessly diseased and purposely concealed ? Who can, view- 

 ing the stables where the hardest worked of the equine race are stowed 

 away, wonder that glanders is rarely absent from such nurseries for con- 

 tamination ? 



6 



