youatt's complimexts to bishop. 211 



the mark in the lower nippers. It is called Bisliojying, 

 from the name of the scoundrel who invented it. The 

 horse of eight or nine years is thrown, and with an 

 engraver's tool a hole is dug in the now almost plain 

 surface of the corner teeth, its shape resembling the 

 mark in those of a seven-year-old horse. The hole is 

 then burned with a heated iron, and a permanent 

 black stain is left. The next pair of nippers are some- 

 times lightly touched also. 



^•' An unprofessional man would be easily deceived by 

 this fraud, but it cannot deceive the trained eye of the 

 horseman. The irregular appearance of the cavity, 

 the diffusion of the bluck stain around the tushes — 

 the sharp points and concave inner surface of which 

 can never be given again — the marks on the upper nip- 

 pers, together with the general conformation of the 

 horse, will prevent deception. Moreover, in compar- 

 ing the lower with tlie upper nippers, unless the oper- 

 ator has performed on the latter also, they will be 

 found to be considerably more worn than the lower, 

 the reverse of wliich ought to be the case. Occasion- 

 ally a clever operator will burn all the teeth to a prop- 

 erly regulated depth, and then a practiced eye alone 

 will detect the imposition."* 



* Rough on the Russians. — Surgeon John C. Knowlson 

 makes the following open confession (" The Complete Farrier, 

 or Horse Doctor," p. 150): " I was hired by Anthony Johnson, 

 of Wincohnlee, Hail, as farrier to a number of horses that were 

 going to Moscow, Russia. We had a liitla gray, seventeen-year- 

 old liors3, named Pentum, whose mouth I bishopHd. He passed 

 for six years old. was the firsb lioise sold, and brought £500, 

 Enfrlish m-ney ! I only mention this as a caution to horsemen." 



Surgeon Knowlson could have evidently beaten the late Pres- 

 ident Lincoln in a (wooden) horse trade. 



