MANAGEMENT OF LIGHT HORSES. 163 



and particles of litter, and these tend to make a stable smell. 

 On the whole the writer is inclined to advocate a paving of the 

 very best yellow clinker bricks, and with no more slope either 

 to the centre or fore and aft than is absolutely necessary to 

 cause the water to run off. The bricks should, of course, be 

 laid in cement about four or five inches deep. The channels 

 are best left alone as the litter will give the horse a foothold. 



DRAINING. 



We learn from the Badminton Library that the Duke of 

 Beaufort solves the difficult question of how to drain stables 

 by having no drains at all. Each loose box is paved with 

 stone slabs, and there is no drain whatever, the moisture being 

 absorbed by the straw. There is no doubt a good deal to be 

 said in favour of this plan, inasmuch as the smell of a stable 

 arises not so much from what has been freshly dropped as 

 from the remains of previous droppings, and the odour caused 

 by faulty drains, those which permit of the smell to travel 

 from the sort of cistern sometimes used. The writer speaks 

 feelingly on this subject, as a few years ago he took a house 

 to which was attached some apparently excellent stabling. 

 On opening the doors of the loose boxes the smell was, to use 

 a common phase, "enough to knock you down." A workman 

 was sent for, and it was then discovered that the urine from 

 each of the boxes drained into a tank which was connected 

 with the drain pipe. In this tank was found the deposit of 

 years, and the only wonder was how the horses of the pre- 

 vious tenant had managed to exist at all. 



The malodorous state of the above mentioned stables evi- 

 dently arose from a desire to keep the urine for manuring 

 purposes an object laudable in itself, yet as a rule wholly 

 incompatible with having stables in a sweet and wholesome 

 condition, unless the connection between the tank and the 

 pipe is effectually cut off. In draining, as in ventilating, 

 position may enter largely into the question ; and a plan 



