INDIVIDUAL HYGIENE 



135 



man with considerable energy, and with the utterance of a peculiar whistling 

 noise, which may be taken as a habit on the part of the operator, but is also 

 considered by some people to be soothing to the horse. The wisp is usually 

 brought down upon the skin with a certain amount of force, and then drawn 

 along the hair, and the whole effect is doubtless very complete as a method 

 of beating out the dust from the animal's coat. 



The brush that is employed in the first instance is known as a dandy 

 brush. (See fig. 486.) At different times during the application of this 

 brush the attendant employs the curry-comb, an instrument with an 

 iron back, having secured to it a series of small plates with fine saw-like 

 teeth, intended solely for the cleaning of the brush from the accumula- 

 tion of dirt and loosened portions of cuticle (dandruff), of which word 

 the name given to the brush is evidently a corruption. The curry-comb 

 is sometimes resorted to 

 for the purpose of assis- 

 ting in cleaning a thick 

 coat and a very scurfy 

 skin; it is hardly neces- 

 sary to say that the curry- 

 comb was never intended 

 for any such purpose, and 

 that its use is altogether 

 objectionable. In fact, unless considerable care is exercised, it may- 

 happen that the skin of the animal, to which a new and therefore sharp 

 curry-comb is applied, may be considerably damaged at those parts where 

 the skin is closely applied to bone, as in the protuberant part of the 

 hips, for instance, and the owner of a horse observing such injuries may 

 be pretty safe in suspecting the curry-comb, and in declining altogether 

 to believe the ordinary explanation that the horse has scratched himself 

 against a wall or the side of the stall. 



The feet and legs, in muddy weather especially, are generally washed, and 

 in the case of hunters, which after a run in heavy country in wet weather 

 are covered with mud on the legs and lower parts of the body, washing with 

 hot or cold water according to fancy is usually employed after the scraper 

 has been used to clear away the greater portion of the mud. This procedure, 

 so usual, and on the face of it so natural, a way of getting rid of the dirt 

 that the stableman would have been once condemned as inefficient and idle 

 if he had neglected it, has for a very long time continued without the least 

 suspicion that it could under any circumstances be objectionable. It was 

 very well known, however, that there existed a disease of the skin, which 

 was called mud fever on account of its affecting horses which were working 



Fig. 486. Dandy Brush 



