HORSES. 76 



be guessed at from certain indications ; but these guesses 

 are usually made with considerable accuracy by experi- 

 enced people. If his teeth shut close, and meet even, 

 are tolerably white, not over long, and his gums appear 

 plump, you may conclude he is not yet nine years old. 

 At that age, and as he advances, his teeth become yellow 

 and foul, and appear to lengthen, from the shrinking and 

 receding of the gums. The tushes are blunt at nine ; but 

 at ten years old, the cavity or channel on the inside of the 

 upper tushes, until that period to be felt by the finger, are 

 entirely filled up. At eleven, the teeth will be very long, 

 black, and foul, but will generally meet even ; at twelve, 

 his upper-jaw teeth will overhang the nether j at thir- 

 teen, and upwards, his tushes will be either worn to the 

 stumps, or long, black and foul, like those of an old boar. 

 Beside those exhibited by the mouth, nature ever fur- 

 nishes a variety of signals, denoting the approach of old 

 age and decay, tnroughout the bodies of all animals. 

 After a horse has passed his prime, a hoUowness of his 

 temples will be perceived , his muscles will be continu- 

 ally losing something of their plumpness ; and his hair, 

 that gloss and burnish which is the characteristic of 

 youth and prime, will look dead, faded, or entirely lose 

 its color in various parts. In proportion to the excess of 

 these appearances, will be the horse's age. 



The following are among the devices practised by a 

 set of unfeeling rascals, who have no other rule of con- 

 duct than their supposed interest to counterfeit the marks 

 of age in horses. At four years old, they will frequently 

 knock out the remaining colt's teeth, in order to make 

 the horse appear five ; but you will be convinced of the 

 fraud by the non-appearance of the tushes ; and if it be 

 a mare, by a shortness and smallness of the corner teeth, 

 and, indeed, of the teeth in general. To give an old horse 

 the mark, is termed to bishop him ; from the name of a 

 noted operator. They burn a hole in each of the corner 

 teeth, and make the shell fine and thin, with some iron 

 instrument, scraping all the teeth to make them white ; 

 sometimes they even file them all down short and even. 



