ON HOUGHING HOUSES. 121 



lie should raise his heels off the road in order to stick 

 into it his toes, he then discovers that while the hind 

 portion of his shoe which he abstains from using has 

 been roughed for him, the front part, which, for the 

 ascent, especially requires to be roughed, has been left 

 untouched. Even to gallop a horse, shod in the English 

 fashion, over level ice, is exceedingly dangerous ; for 

 although, so long as by a powerful bit he is forced on 

 his haunches, the two cogs at the back of each shoe take 

 hold, yet, if the poor animal be allowed to drop his head 

 in order to propel himself at his utmost speed by his 

 unroughed toes, they immediately slip from under him, 

 and he thus experiences a defect, which it is astonishing 

 should have been so long perpetrated by a nation who, 

 at an enormous expenditure of time, intelligence, and 

 money, have succeeded in rearing a breed of horses, the 

 finest in the world, coveted by every foreigner, but which 

 they persist in rudely roughing in the wrong way ! 



SADDLES. 



If a saddle does not come down upon the withers and 

 back-bone of a horse, the closer it approaches them the 

 firmer it fits ; and as, in the matrimonial alliance which 



