204 



EVILS OF MODERN STABLES. 



prevalence of utter despair. Should a visitor enter the building, every 

 head is raised and every eye is turned toward the welcome intruder. 



A STRANGER HAS ENTERED THE STABLE. 



The universal bustle which follows his appearance bespeaks how the 

 lucky arrival has allowed the limbs to be stretched and the positions to 

 be altered. For a moment or two, the straw is in audible commotion, 

 while the sinkers, or blocks fastening the collar reins, may knock against 

 the mangers, and the noise elicits no angry remonstrance. 



But as joy hailed his appearance, so does the dullness deepen on the 



stranger's departure. From that 

 moment, any relaxation becomes 

 a fault. All pastime is unlawful ; 

 the most innocent amusement 

 must be practiced silently and in 

 secret. Certain animals, however, 

 try to get through the long hours 

 of enforced idleness by quietly 

 nibbling at the topmost rail of the 

 manger. Large portions of tough 

 wood are often removed after this 

 fashion; and to him who can 

 rightly interpret signs, a thick 

 post bitten away, fiber by fiber, will present melancholy evidence of that 

 longing for employment which could induce so great a waste of per- 

 severance ; for animals are naturally great economists of labor. 



Other prisoners will endeavor to cheat the time by licking their 

 mangers, apparently in the hope that some stray grain of corn may have 



NIBBLING THE WOOD-WORK. 



