LATERAL FACES OF THE BODV. 159 



curvature of the ribs. In fact, it is known that by depressing a cylinder 

 its capacity can be reduced without diminishing its surface. 



It is not correct to believe that the height of the chest is always 

 proportionate to the height of the withers. We have Already shown 

 that tlie length of the spinal apophyses of this region is subject to 

 numerous variations, and that the prominence of the withers often 

 depends upon the mode of suspension of the trunk between the 

 anterior members. 



A horse whose chest has a good height should, according to M. 

 Gayot,^ measure a greater distance from the top of the withers to the 

 interior face of the sternum than from this point to the ground. The 

 first distance would exceed the second thirty centimetres in well-formed 

 saddle- and driving-horses, with a height of about one hundred and 

 sixty centimetres, whilst it might not be more than fifteen or twenty 

 centimetres in animals of an inferior conformation. 



We must acknowledge that we are still ignorant of the exact pro- 

 portions. Not only is the distance between the ground and the xiphoid 

 region not equal to the height of the chest, but the latter is always 

 several centimetres greater ; the difference may even be twenty centi- 

 metres. Our measures have been made with the aid of the metrical 

 standard and the compass of depth upon more than fifty horses of all 

 varieties, — slow and rapid workers, saddle- and race-horses, etc. ; they 

 have been taken upon common horses, Percherons, Boulonnaise, Bel- 

 gians, Bretons, Normans, Berrichons, Andalusians, Barbs, Tarbans, and 

 English thoroughbreds. 



It is scarcely necessary to add that this height must be examined 

 from the side of the chest ; it would be impossible to appreciate it 

 accurately by viewing the region from any other direction. The chest, 

 to be high and well descended, should extend well below the summit of 

 the elbow. 



2d. Width. — The width of the chest is the result of the curva- 

 ture of its osseous parts. It is measured from the middle ribs to those 

 which correspond to them upon the opposite lateral plane. To do this, 

 the observer is stationed in front of the animal, so as to see the profile 

 of the ribs and the degree in which they project beyond the shoulders 

 on the right and the left. The roundness of the ribs is also judged 

 by viewing the horse obliquely, either in front or behind. 



It is not necessary to refer here to the advantages of a large trans- 

 verse development of the thoracic cavity, but we would caution the 



1 L. Moll et Eug. Gayot, La connaissance g6n6rale du cheval, Paris, 1861, p. 137. 



