346 THE HORSE. 



after his g-reatcoat and all his body clothes have been stripped from him, and 

 he has been turned out naked, when the mercury in the thermometer is below 

 the freezing point? Does he not often stand, hour after hour, in the road or 

 the street, while his owner is warming himself within, and this perhaps after 

 every pore has been opened by a brushing gallop } and his susceptibility to 

 the painful and the injurious influence of cold has been excited to the 

 utmost ? 



It is not so generally known as it ought to be, that the return to a hot 

 stable is quite as dangerous as the change from a heated atmosphere to a 

 cold and biting air. Many a horse, that has travelled without harm over 

 a bleak country, has been suddenly seized with inflammation and fever 

 when he has, immediately at the endof his journey, been surrounded with 

 heated and foul air. It is the sudden change of temperature, whether from 

 heat to cold, or from cold to heat, that does the mischief, and yearly 

 destroys a multitude of horses. 



The stable should be as large, compared with the number of horses 

 which it is destined to contain, as circumstances will allow. A stable for 

 six horses should not be less than forty feet in length, and thirteen or 

 fourteen feet wide. If there be no loft above, the inside of the roof should 

 always be plastered, to prevent direct currents of air and occasional drop- 

 pings from broken tiles ; and the heated and foul air should escape, and cool 

 and^'pure air be admitted, by elevation of the central tiles ; or by large tubes 

 carried through the roof, with caps a little above them to prevent the 

 beating in of the rain ; or by gratings placed high up in the walls. These 

 latter apertures should be as far above the horses as they can conveniently 

 be placed, by which means all injurious draught will be prevented. 



If there is aloft above the stable, the ceiling should be plastered in order 

 to prevent the foul air from penetrating to the hay above, and injuring 

 both its taste and its wholesomeness ; and no openings should be allowed 

 above the racks, through which the hay may be thrown into the rack, for 

 they also will permit the foul air to ascend to the provender, and, in the act 

 of filling the rack, and while the horse is eagerly gazing upward for his food, 

 many a grass-seed has fallen into his eye, and produced considerable in- 

 flammation ; while at other times, when the careless groom has left open 

 the trapdoor, a stream of cold air beats down on the head of the horse. 



The stable with a loft over it should never be less than twelve feet high, 

 and proper ventilation should be secured either by tubes carried up 

 through the loft to the roof, or by gratings close to the ceiling. These 

 gratings or openings should be enlarged or contracted by means of a 

 covering or shutter, so that during spring, summer, and autumn, the stable 

 should possess nearly the same temperature with the open air, and, in 

 winter, a temperature not more than ten degrees above that of the external 

 atmosphere. A hot stable has, in the mind of the groom, been long connected 

 with a glossy coat. The latter, it is thought, cannot be attained without 

 the former. To this we should reply that, in winter, a thin, glossy coat is 

 not desirable. Nature gives to every animal a warmer clothing when the 

 cold weather approaches. The horse acquires a thicker and a lengthened 

 coat, in order to defend him from the surrounding cold. INIan puts on an 

 additional and a warmer covering, and his comfort is increased and his 

 health preserved by it. He who knows anything of the horse, or cares 

 anything for his enjoyment, will not object to a coat a little longer and a 

 little roughened, when the wintry wind blows bleak. The coat, however, 

 need not be so long as to be unsightly ; and warm clothing, even in a cool 

 stable, will, with plenty of honest grooming, keep the hair sufficiently 



