66 OF STEAMING AND PREPARING FOOD FOR ANIMALS. 



referred to ; yet an occasional run at grass will improve the 

 condition. If indigestible substances are given to the horse, 

 the stomach becomes overworked • and it follows that when 

 an organ is overtaxed, other parts of the system become 

 sympathetically affected, and the chemico-vital machinery is 

 clogged. This is in accordance with nature's laws, which 

 are immutable and uncompromising ; whenever they are vio- 

 lated the penalty is sure to follow. Men who prepare horses 

 for the market attempt to get them into condition, without 

 any regard to their general health, the climate, quantity of 

 food, its quality, or the state of the digestive organs. Men 

 are very apt to think, that as long as the animal has what 

 they term good food, and just as much as they can cram into 

 the stomach, they mnst fatten ; when, in fact, such an 

 enormous quantity of food oppresses the stomach, impairs the 

 digestive organs, and converts the food into a cause of disease. 

 As soon as the stomach is overworked, the food accumulates ; 

 distends the viscera, interferes with the motion of the dia- 

 phragm, presses on the liver, and interrupts the circulation of 

 the blood through that organ, seriously interfering with the 

 bile-secreting process. Many thousands of our most valuable 

 horses die in consequence of being too well, or, rather, inju- 

 diciously fed. Reader, if you own horses, let them have 

 their meals at regular hours, in sufficient quantity, and no 

 more ; good straw on which they may rest their weary limbs ; 

 good stables, well ventilated ; let them not be compelled to 

 breathe the emanations that arise from the dung or urine ; 

 keep them clean, avoid undue exposure ; don't work them too 

 soon after feeding : finally, govern them in a spirit of kind- 

 ness, and there will be little foothold for disease. 



OF STEAMING AND PREPARING FOOD FOR ANIMALS. 



"On one occasion a number of cows were selected from a 

 large stock, for the express purpose of making the trial : they 



