60 THE HORSE : ITS KEEP AND MANAGEMENT. 



and able to do their work better at twenty years of age than 

 those which have not been used to lying down would at 

 fourteen years old. When I say horses do not lie down at 

 all I mean after they have become old and blind. I have 

 known horses live to be twenty-five and thirty-five years 

 old ; one I have in my mind now is thirty-three next 

 foaling. 



This book, as I said in the commencement, is not so 

 much for those who keep a number of horses as for 

 individuals who go in for the ones and twos. In the cold 

 frosty weather when a horse is standing in the stable doing 

 nothing, and getting very little exercise, it becomes very 

 cold and the hair stands on end, even when it has 

 a cloth on it. When a horse's legs are cold the ears 

 are usually the same, and when the latter are cold it is an 

 indication that the horse is cold all over. I have noticed 

 that when a horse is cold in the stable, after it has laid 

 down for a couple of hours, it gets up quite 

 warm. This is another reason why horses should be 

 encouraged to lie down more. 



I may explain why this is. Horses have nothing upon 

 their legs, beside bone, sinew, and the skin, so the blood 

 circulating down the legs becomes cooled and flows back 

 through the heart, and gradually chills the whole body 

 If the horse lies down the circulation is easier and more 

 rapid. 



