44 PRACTICAL OBSERVATIONS. 



on their legs. Another thing, training grooms of 

 the old school were too much in the habit of 

 letting horses of all descriptions go on with 

 their work, until, as they considered, they were 

 drawn sufficiently fine to come the length they 

 had to run, not making due allowances that the 

 length a horse may have to run might be short, 

 and that the horse's wind, from the work he had 

 been doing, may be good enough to enable him 

 to go on in his race, and finish at his best pace, 

 without his being worked to too great an excess, 

 with a view to reduce him of his flesh. 



This sort of treatment was too much adopted 

 with gluttonous horses, that were mostly en- 

 gaged, after a certain age, to run long lengths 

 under high weights, as in country running. As 

 such horses generally fed voraciously, it was 

 often difficult to keep many of them from putting 

 up a great deal of flesh; and as grooms usually 

 considered that those horses could not run, un- 

 less drawn very fine, it was, therefore, the cus- 

 tom with many of them, to work these horses ac- 

 cording as they fed, concluding that the more 

 work they could get into them, provided they 

 kept feeding, the lighter they would be in 

 flesh, and the stouter and longer they would be 



