288 THE SO-CALLED '^INCAPACITATING VICES." 



Why should all inhabitants of the stable be subjected to a sameness 

 of treatment ? Why should all horses be expected to consume the same 

 food: to eat the like quantities of provender; to drink a particular 

 amount of water, and to be clothed in uniform, when left for the night ? 

 It may please the eye of the groom to behold the animals all wrapped 

 up and bedded down to match, as he quits the stable for the night ; yet, 

 where life is concerned, something stronger should regulate arrangements 

 than the gratification of a servant's prejudice. 



To propitiate the inclinations or the whims of a retainer, constituted 

 no part of the motive which caused the stables to be erected. Such 

 places are professedly built /or horses, and the animals, therefore, should 

 be primarily regarded. Yet, wherefore oblige a quadruped to be covered 

 up with a rug, when the creature, by a nightly destruction of the wrap- 

 per, asserts the envelope to be objectionable ? Why compel an unwil- 

 ling steed to endure that which is not requisite on the score of decency ; 

 which cannot be adopted on any plea of appearance ; and which, in the 

 most emphatic manner, is declared not pleasant to the life on whose body 

 it is suspended ? 



It is impossible to comprehend that the groom possesses any excess 

 of modesty which can be offended at the notion of a horse sleeping 

 naked in the stall ; and if the absence of covering is agreeable to the 

 party which is principally concerned, it seems odd a reasonable being 

 should insist that a contrary practice shall be adopted. Still, persist 

 these individuals certainly do ; and even carry their persistence to other 

 particulars. The skins of the equine race are as various in degrees of 

 sensibility as can be those of human beings. There do exist many men 

 who, for pleasure, first soak their bodies in warm baths, and subsequently 

 polish the cuticle with the hardest possible of flesh brushes. Others would 

 only be gratified were they daily rubbed down with brick bats. On the 

 contrary, there exist individuals on whom a 

 ruck in the finest linen will inflict a discomfort 

 which, in its intensity, almost amounts to an 

 agony. 



So there are horse possessing hides to which 



may be applied with impunity the sharpest and 



coarsest of curry-combs. But there also live 



many animals having skins to which the oldest 



and bluntest of those antiquated scratchers will 



occasion a sensation the acuteness of which is 



AN EXCITED HORSE'S MOUTH. testified to by the violence of resistance with 



which the morning's dressing shall be accompanied. Yet, rather than 



obey the hint so energetically conveyed, or discard the employment of 



