HORSE DEALERS. 47 



not answer our expectation, or perhaps his representa- 

 tion. That is the nature of the animal in which he 

 deals. I kQow of no commercial transaction in which 

 a man is so often deceived, and in which he so often 

 deceives himself, as in the horse. Dealers are often, 

 much oftener than is supposed, deceived themselves. 

 Respectable dealers do take every precaution in their 

 power not to get an unsound horse into their stable, 

 they cannot, however, with all their precaution, at all 

 times prevent this. But they will not in such a case 

 risk their character by selling such a horse to their 

 customers. A horse may be purchased in the country 

 from the breeder apparently sound. He may hitherto 

 have been so and yet before he may have been at work 

 one week he may be the very reverse. Some hidden 

 internal cause that the most practised eye could not 

 detect may have long existed, the effects of which only 

 become apparent on the animal being put to work. 

 Here no blame can possibly be attached to the dealer. 

 He has bought him with every warranty of soundness, 

 has traveled him perhaps several hundred miles home, 

 has had him several days in his stable and found him 

 all that he expected. He has every right to think him 

 a sound horse and as such he sold him. Still, such a 

 horse may deceive both the dealer and purchaser when 

 put to the test of work and change of treatment. 



