THE HORSE. 123 



the reader will perceive, not one of the pleasing kind 

 to me, will be in place here : returning from the 

 cattle show, I met, in Gray's Inn Road, a powerful 

 fellow, apparently belonging to a livery stable, upon 

 a bay nag, trotting, which he checked with a powerful 

 curb and all his force repeatedly, at very quick inter- 

 vals, as though it were his purpose to break the ani- 

 mal's jawbone, at the same time ramming the spurs 

 into him with the utmost force, in similar repetitions. 

 The horse made no resistance, but trotted on quietly. 

 Now, in the name of common sense and rational 

 horsemanship, what could be the intent and purpose of 

 all this ? I am yet too young and inexperienced to 

 discover in it any probable or possible advantage. 



SECTION XXL— Purchase. 



To commence with the hackney. Every one knows 

 the resorts for buying and selling horses — fairs, repo- 

 sitories, and the stables of dealers. Few, moreover, 

 are ignorant of the considerable difficulty, notwith- 

 standing such vast numbers of horses are bred in this 

 country, of obtaining that which may be truly pro- 

 nounced a good, sound, and useful hack : the reason 

 of this, however, is sufficiently obvious. In the first 

 place, the number of ill-formed horses, calculated nei- 

 ther for use or beauty of figure, notwithstanding our 

 great advantages as a breeding country, seems out of 

 all fair proportion, and the early and excessive labour 

 to which we expose them, subjects them to such pre- 

 mature decay, that it is too often very difficult to 

 meet with a second-hand, or worked nag, in a tho- 

 roughly sound state, however young he may be. The 



