3&0 TH2 iiORSE. 



animal to compose himself to sleep. This half-lig^ht more particularly suits 

 horses of heavy work, and who draw almost as much by the weight of 

 carcass which they can throw into the collar, as by the defrree of muscular 

 energ-y of which they are capable. In the quietness of a dimly-lighted stable 

 they obtain repose, and accumulate flesh and fat. Dealers are perfectly 

 aware of this. They have their darkened stables, in which the young 

 horse, with little or no exercise, and fed upon mashes and ground corn, is 

 made up for sale. The round and plump appearance, however, which 

 may delude the unwary, soon vanishes with altered treatment, and the 

 animal is found to be unfit for hard work, and predisposed to every inflam- 

 matory disease. The circumstances, then, under which a stable some- 

 what darkened may be allowed, will be easily determined by the owner 

 of the horse ; but, as a general rule, dark stables are unfriendly to cleanli- 

 ness, and the frequent cause of the vice of starting, and of the most serious 

 diseases of the eyes. 



GROOMING* 



Of this much need not be said, since custom, and, apparently without ill 

 effect, has allotted so little of the comb and the brush to the farmer's 

 horse. The animal that is worked all day, and turned out at night, re- 

 quires little more to be done to him than to have the dirt brushed off his 

 limbs. Regular grooming, by rendering his skin more sensible to the 

 alteration of temperature, and the inclemency of the weather, would be 

 prejudicial. The horse that is altogether turned out needs no grooming. 

 The dandriff or scurf which accumulates at the roots of the hair is a pro- 

 vision of nature to defend him from the wind and the cold. 



It is to the stabled horse, highly fed, and little or irregularly worked, that 

 grooming is of so much consequence. Good rubbing with the brush or 

 the currycomb opens the pores of the skin, and circulates the blood to the 

 extremities of the body and through the minute vessels of the skin, and 

 produces free and healthy perspiration, and stands in the room of exer- 

 cise. No horse will carry a fine coat without either heat or dressing. 

 They both effect the same purpose ; they both increase the insensible 

 perspiration : but the first does it at the expense of health and strength, 

 while the second, at the same time that it produces a glow on the skin, and 

 a determination of blood to it, rouses all the energies of the frame. It 

 would be well for the proprietor of the horse if he were to insist upon it, 

 and to see that his orders are really obeyed, that the fine coat in which 

 he and his groom so much delight, is produced by honest rubbing, and 

 not by a heated stable and thick clothing, and most of all, not by stimu- 

 lating or injurious spices. 



When the weather will permit the horse to be taken out, he should 

 never be groomed in the stable. Without dwelling on the want of clean- 

 liness, wiien the scurf and dust that are brushed from the horse lodge 

 in his manger, and mingle with his food, experience teaches, tliat if the 

 cold is not too great, the animal is braced and invigorated from being 

 dressed in the open air, to a degree that cannot be attained in the stable. 

 There is no necessity, however, ibr half the punishment which many a 

 groom inflicts upon the horse in the act of dressing; and particularly 

 on one whose skin is thin and sensible. The currycomb should at all 

 imes be lightly applied. With many horses its use may be almost dis- 

 pensed with ; and even the brush need not be so hard, nor the points of 

 the bristles so irregular as they often are. A soft brush, with a little more 

 weight of the hand, will be equally effectual, and a great deal more pleasant 



