EXAMINATION OF THE MOUTH FOK AGE. 93 



front or middle permanent incisors, as the case may be, do 

 not show wear commensurate with the fact of the absence 

 of the milk-teeth^ that have been removed. Also, the 

 extent of the eruption of the replacing teeth is, often, not 

 sufficient to account for the fall of the milk-teeth which 

 preceded them. Many copers being ignorant that, as a 

 great rule, the upper milk incisors fall out earlier than 

 the lower ones, remove some of the latter only, and thus 

 perpetrate a most transparent fraud. 



Dates from icliich horses are aged. — In England, 

 thoroughbreds take their age from 1st January. Thus, 

 an animal of Stud-Book parentage dropped any time, 

 say, in the year 1887, would remain a foal till the 31st 

 December, 1887; would be a yearling on the following 

 day, and would remain so up to the 31st December, 1888 ; 

 and he will be a two-year-old from the 1st January, 

 1889, to the 31st December, 1889. Horses that are not 

 thoroughbred, take their ages, in England, usually from 

 the 1st May. In Australia, Tasmania, New Zealand, and 

 South Africa, horses are aged from the 1st August. For 

 instance, a colt born, say, in September, 1886, or in 

 March, 1887, will be a two-year-old on the 1st August, 

 1888. If we want to age a young horse, the actual date of 

 whose birth is unknown to us, we should, in case of doubt, 

 assign to him the younger of the two ages, if his "class 

 birthday " be near at hand ; the older of the two, if it be 

 recently past. Thus, suppose an Australian horse had a 



