THE SO-CALLED "INCAPACITATING VICES." 291 



eyes of a horse, the reader is referred to the " Illustrated Horse Doctor," 

 (pp. 49 and 56,) wherein the proper plan is amply detailed. 



The reason for recommending what the reader may regard as a trouble- 

 some acquisition and a strange knowledge for a gentleman to bore over, 

 is, because those livery stable-keepers who let horses out to strangers, 

 can hardly be expected to maintain a very valuable stud for such pur- 

 poses. It is not asserted that these tradesmen knowingly send out very 

 defective animals ; but they could not, perhaps, in the way of business, 

 warrant, as decidedly sound, any inhabitant of their stables. The eyes 

 are the parts which generally fail. Exposed to a tainted atmosphere 

 and fixed close to a whitened wall, when at home; wearing blinkers 

 unpleasantly near to the organs, when abroad; while, at other times, 

 they carry a saddle, having the eye exposed to the full glare of the 

 sun, — it is not a subject for wonder that bodies so sensitively endowed 

 and delicately organized should become diseased. 



Added to the natural results of such causes is the treatment experi- 

 enced from brutal and ignorant fellows, whom a few shillings have 

 invested with a whip. Such persons are fond of slashing the horse 

 over the head, and may thus produce partial opacity of the cornea. (See 

 "Illustrated Horse Doctor," p. 46.) The effect of imperfect vision is to 

 create alarm in a highly imaginative but an excessively timid animal. 

 Shying is the consequence, and this act is as various in its developments 

 as its causes may be numerous. Probably this will be best explained 

 by relating a circumstance which, a few years ago, occurred to a friend 

 of the author's. 



A young gentleman, native of Ireland, complained one street was so 

 like another, that though he should live a thousand years in London, he 

 should still see nothing of the town. He wished to view the suburbs 

 to ascertain the situation of the metropolis ; with this purpose in view, 

 he, one afternoon, hired a horse at a West End livery stables, and trotted 

 upon the Uxbridge Road. Everything went pleasantly till steed and 

 rider had reached Ealing Common, when, there being nothing in view, 

 the gentleman gave the quadruped its head, and allowed it to proceed 

 at its own pace. The pair, however, had only gone a short distance, 

 when, from some motive not recognizable to human perception, the 

 creature was seized with a violent fit of "swerving;" or, in other words, 

 it suddenly left the road, and, moving sideways, began describing a 

 rather wide semicircle upon the common, which was, at the place, 

 fortunately smooth and level. 



But Ealing Common appears to be a favorite spot with laundresses, 

 who there hang out their wet linen. The rider was dragged under one 

 of the lines, loaded with damp clothes, while his horse pushed against 



