DURING THE WINTER MONTHS. 73 



the groom: sucli things more principally arise 

 from unforeseen circumstances; as, for example, 

 a strong constitutional country plate horse, that 

 may have been travelling from race to race dur- 

 ing summer, and occasionally, perhaps, running 

 three times a fortnight, such a horse's feet, on his 

 arriving at the home stables late in the autumn, 

 would be in rather a shattered state, from the 

 circumstance of his shoes and plates having 

 been so often removed, as to have occasioned the 

 wall or crust of his feet to be much broken; in 

 short, this used to be a very common occurrence. 

 A horse arriving at home in the state we have here 

 described, the training-groom considers, and very 

 properly, that such a horse will not be in a fit 

 state to go again into training before the month 

 of March; he is also aware, that this same horse 

 cannot be so well got fresh by standing in a stall 

 stable, as he can by being put into a loose place. 

 The horse being properly prepared, by being gra- 

 dually stripped, and having, if not too low in 

 flesh, as I before noticed, a couple of doses of 

 physic given him, the groom orders him to be put 

 into a large loose place, or barn-like sort of stable. 

 Now, with the exception of the horse's feet being- 

 broken away, there may be nothing more the 

 matter with him, unless, indeed, his back. 



