i6o The Book of the Horse. 



"The weight drawn in a two-wheeled dray is from 3 tons 16 cwt. to 4 tons; two horses 

 used, sometimes three. 



"The weight drawn in a four-wheel van is from 6 tons to 6 tons 10 cwt.; three horses 

 are used, sometimes four. 



" Their food consists of — 



Oats, 13 lbs., beans, 6 lbs., maize, 3 lbs. = 22 lbs. per day per horse. 

 Clover chaff, about ....15,,,, „ 



37 )) »» ft 



Sometimes peas are given, then either beans or maize are stopped. 



" From April to September about two thousand bundles of green tares are consumed 

 amongst the sick and rest horses. 



" From May to August three hundred bundles of green tares are given to all the horses every 

 week for about fourteen or fifteen weeks ; one bundle is given to each horse on Saturday 

 evening, and one on Sunday morning. Carrots are occasionally given. 



" The cost of feeding, including the above items, amounts to about three shillings per horse 

 per day. 



" Brewers' horses are not, as you suggest, kept for ornament, but for work. 



" Shoeing costs about one shilling and eightpence per week, being about fifty-nine shoes 

 per horse per year. As a matter of course, some horses wear their shoes out sooner than others. 



"The diseases to which brewers' dray-horses are subject are catarrh, influenza, bronchitis, 

 congestion of the lungs (more in summer from violent exertion), nephritis, hepatitis, weed, 

 cellulitis, colic (more cases of colic on commencing green food), sandcracks, treads, quittors, 

 and wounds from picking up nails, stones, and other foreign agents in the streets. We have 

 had several cases of ruptured livers between 1867 and 1874, the livers in these cases weighing 

 respectively 73 lbs., 89 lbs., 82 lbs., 61 lbs., and loi lbs. 



" Horses will drink beer if they can get it. We generally give it when they are recovering 

 from an illness, and with beneficial results. 



" The vulgar idea which exists that brewers' horses are fed upon wet grains is incorrect. 



" Dray-horses are not so heavy as they used to be ; they are shorter and stouter. The animal 

 known as a ' little big horse ' is preferred ; a smaller horse is more active, and gets over the ground 

 quicker; this accounts for the great demand at the present time for the Clydesdale breed. 



" I think the popular opinion that roans, red and blue, are more hardy than horses of 

 other colours, is correct. 



" We use neither bearing-reins, nor winkers on the bridles. 



" In a few years' time the brewer's two-wheel drays will be a thing of the past. They are 

 a great weight upon the horses' backs. I have known several instances where horses have been 

 permanently injured through falling down, and a cask of beer, generally a puncheon, weighing 

 over 8 cwt., rolling over their loins." 



THE SIIIRE OR ENGI.I.SH CART-HORSE. 



The Shire horse is the final result of the improvements of agricultural horses com- 

 menced early in the first half of this century. He is found in the shires where the strongest 

 class of plough-horses are required — a breed, if it is a breed, which has superseded the Lincolnshire 

 black horse, which Bakewell of Ditchley, the first man who clearly laid down the principles 



