BREAKING AND TRAINING. 467 



than the horn of the hoof can endure the results of dryness or the 

 hardness of a baked English clay. 



Yet the training horse is housed in stables the temperature of which 

 is oppressive, the foulness of which must be most injurious to the pris- 

 oner. It is there shut in stench and in darkness to recruit its strength, 

 and to gain fresh energy to endure further reduction. Exercised, when 

 nature would dispose the animal to rest; forced to submit to a fainting 

 warmth, when instinct would induce the creature to seek the coolest 

 shade; ridden, till it almost fails; physicked, till it reels; and sweated, 

 till the process makes it fear the opening of its stable door, — how is the 

 trained quadruped nurtured ? How is it supported, to fortify the body 

 for bearing up against such numerous trials ? 



It is compelled to consume hard corn and fibrous hay. Water is 

 stinted. The measures just described must generate a raging thirst; 

 but the trainer, according to his system, refuses drink. The contents of 

 the manger must aggravate the dryness of the throat ; but the trainer 

 begrudgingly permits the animal to imbibe the contents of the pail. 

 The mode of feeding is productive of other evils. Purging and sweating 

 are excused, as necessary to remove accumulations of fat. Com and 

 hay are those very substances which induce the accumulation of fatl 

 Then, according to the present trainer's pretended system, one thing 

 does that which another undoes. Whether nature is invigorated by 

 such a process, the reader must decide. But, in the author's opinion, 

 the existing method is a prejudice, which reason condemns, and which 

 man is not justified in compelling any creature to undergo. 



All the foregoing customs are, in the author's judgment, decidedly 

 wrong. The stable should be cool — not cold — sheltered and airy. The 

 loose box should be large enough for the Umbs to be stretched and for 

 the position to be varied, according to the inclination of the inmate. 

 The kind of equine residence which the writer approves of has already 

 been described ; for information upon this subject, the reader is referred 

 to the chapter treating of " Stables as they should be." 



The food should not be such as requires stone or steel to comminute 

 it. Horses' jaws are not machines urged by steam, by wind, or by water ; 

 but they are only bones acted upon by the contraction of muscular fiber. 

 The exhaustion of a part must, as has been already explained, aflfect the 

 whole ; the exertion of extraordinary power in the head will, therefore, 

 not refresh the limbs. Feed the animal, while being trained, upon soft- 

 ened, not upon watery substances. Do not oblige the body to supply its 

 own moisture, for that is to deprive the system of part of the nourishment 

 which should be devoted to uphold the strength. 



As concerns the articles of food, these should not consist of oats and 



