S8 THE HORSE : ITS TAMING, 



pay for his keep. At three years of age a horse can 

 serve more, beginning, say, with two a week, increasing 

 as you go along, until, after six weeks, he may serve 

 one a day. At four years of age he may be put to 

 full service. I may remark that in high altitudes a 

 horse cannot perform as much service as in lower 

 ones ; and this is corroborated by others, and is an 

 established fact. 



Number of Mares to be served by a Stallio7i. — 

 Never let a horse serve more than two in a day, 

 and this a mature stallion, properly fed and exercised,, 

 should be able to keep up for three months without 

 injury. Some horses may do much more, but I speak 

 of a reasonably vigorous horse. 



I have no hesitation in saying that stud farms which 

 have failed in the past, have simply done so because 

 the principles upon which they were conducted 

 were entirely against the nature of the animal the 

 owners sought to breed and rear to a profit. The farms 

 have been small, therefore, with little work to do. 

 The brood mares (animals strictly gregarious by 

 nature), have been confined in loose boxes. There 

 is no animal that equals the horse in the amount 

 of exercise he will take naturally ; in fact, I have 

 reiterated this remark over and over again in the 

 ring — hunger compels him to take exercise freely, his 

 stomach is so small — that he will walk about 20 hours 

 out of the 24 to keep it filled. In Australia, during 



