174 HACKS AND HUNTERS 



The tail should be carefully pulled at the dock,* 

 so as to remove all the unnecessary short feathery 

 hairs underneath. Only those, however, on the under 

 side of the dock should be pulled and those on top 

 should never be touched, but forced to lie flat by 

 bandaging. The prettiest tail for a hack is that which 

 is pulled at the butt, grows full toward the bottom, 

 and then is absolutely evenly squared off just a little 

 above the hocks. Next best to this is the tail that is 

 switched. 



Under no circumstances should a horse ever be 

 docked. Fortunately fashion never decreed that the 

 thoroughbred should be docked, and now, thank good- 

 ness, the disgusting practice of docking poor half-bred 

 horses has also gone out of fashion. Originally it was 

 merely a dealer's trick, to make the anhnaPs quarters 

 look broader, and owners were inveigled into believing 

 that it looked "smart." But to any real horseman or 

 humane lover of animals it could never be anything but 

 a disgusting, senseless, and cruel practice. The actual 

 pain caused by the operation is nothing compared 

 to the misery, to which a tailless horse is subjected in 

 the summertime, particularly if turned out to grass. 

 Docked horses are unable to defend themselves against 

 the swarms of flies which attack them, and in order 

 to rid themselves of the pests they are obliged to stamp 

 incessantly until the concussion is likely to injure their 

 feet. Watch a long-tailed and a short-tailed animal 

 grazing, and you will observe, that the former seldom 

 makes a move with his feet, while the latter is con- 

 stantly stamping and throwing his head back to his 



* All hairs should be removed by pulling. This is not painful un- 

 less too much is attempted at once. Scissors should never be touched 

 to a tail, nor should the groom be permitted to use a comb on it, as 

 this thins it lamentably. 



