228 DRAUGHT AND HARNESS. 



what is the same thing, mechanically considered, m 

 and n are identical in their action, for although the 

 scroll may appear to work from two separate points , 

 this is merely apparent, and its action is in reality 

 precisely similar or equivalent to that of the bar m. 



Our plan being to point out defects, in the first instance r 

 instead of laying down dogmatically how things should 

 be, we would beg of the reader to consider for a moment 

 whether it is not really very remarkable that, whilst 

 the mathematicians and the practical men all insist 

 on the trace being adjusted so as to work horizontally, 

 the constructors of hames should always place the bar 

 m or the scroll n as if the pull were to be exerted at 

 right-angles to the leg of the hames, through this to the 

 collar, and finally to the horse's shoulder-blade ; and as 

 this latter is never, or at least only in very miserably 

 built horses, quite perpendicular, it follows that the 

 horizontal trace must always act at an angle on the bar 

 m or scroll n, instead of on the prolongation of their 

 axis, thus converting these contrivances into levers for 

 grinding the collar obliquely into the horse's neck or 

 shoulder, instead of pressing it quite flatly and .equably 

 against it. In fact, the names-makers are evidently of 

 our opinion, that the trace should always work at right- 

 angles to the shoulder-blade. Where they do too often 

 differ from us is, in placing the bar m, or scroll n, at the 

 lower third instead of in the middle of the leg of the 

 hames. Let a b, Fig. 19, represent a hames, and p f, p d 

 the draught-bar, placed, in the former case, near its 

 lower extremity ; in the latter, in the centre of the line 

 a b. The horizontal long trace / c H forms, with the 

 draught -bar at /, an angle, and it would also form one 

 if attached at d p f and p d being parallel. The short 



