FAT FORMING NECESSARY. 185 



remarked previously, is a required probation, to enable 

 the succeeding ones to be endured with benefit. 



Air, food, exercise, and a strict attention to cleanliness, 

 are the great adjuncts in bringing all stages to a successful 

 termination. "While walking, there is less liability to get 

 wrong, in comparison with the stage requiring faster work ; 

 but walking can be prolonged till every muscle is inert 

 and inelastic. The coal-heavers or heavy porters would 

 need a good deal of attention and time to bring them to a 

 point to show a speed in a foot race they naturally possess. 

 The muscles, though capable of contracting with powerful 

 effect, take time to do it ; and though strength is gained 

 by walking, rapidity of action is lost. As all parts of the 

 body are nourished and sustained by food and drink, it is 

 of the highest moment that those kinds be used that are 

 not only nutritious, but of the quality that give the charac- 

 teristics we wish to develop. If fat only were required, the 

 variety of food containing the most starch and sugar 

 would be sought for. Fat is of essential service to a horse 

 when commencing training, but only as a surplus that 

 cannot be built up into muscle. That superabundance 

 of food which has been deposited in all the interstices be- 

 tween the muscles, coating, and internal viscera, loading the 

 lungs, has uses which, if we only avail ourselves of, will 

 help us get the animal into condition. While we dimi- 

 nish this, we must do it in a manner that will leave the 

 muscles fuller and more pliable than they possibly could 

 have been if it had been absent. The getting-rid of this 

 fat will be the work of the succeeding stages of prepara- 

 tion. In the preliminary stage, we must watch that it is 

 not decreased, as that would denote want of health, or an 

 insufficiency of food to meet the wastes of the system. Al- 

 most every horse or colt should be able to take the amount 

 of walking exercise yours are now getting. Some fretful, 

 irascible ones, that would rapidly lose flesh from worry- 



