HANDBOOK OF THE TURF. 23 



Asthma. Is closely allied to heaves or broken wind, 

 but is less continuous and more paroxysmal. It is generally 

 believed to be due to spasm of the small circular muscles that 

 surround the bronchial tubes, and its continued existence leads 

 to a paralysis of them. It is legal unsoundness. 



Assuiiiert Names. The American racing rules allow 

 persons to subscribe or enter under an assumed name, but their 

 real and full names must be registered with the clerk of the 

 course, and such persons cannot enter or subscribe in any other, 

 until they resume their own names or register another 

 assumed name. The real or assumed name of any person who 

 runs, or, within twenty years, has run horses in the United 

 States, shall not be registered. 



Atavism. Taking back. The return to an early or 

 original type by its modified descendants; reversion, through 

 the influence of heredity, to ancestral characters ; resemblance 

 to some remote ancestor, exhibited by an animal or individual. 



Attention. Station ; the attitude of a horse when 

 awaiting command. In this position he has his head and 

 neck raised; ears pricked forward; the profile of his face at 

 an angle of about 45 deg. to the ground, and at about a right 

 angle to the upper line of the neck — the crest ; the weight pro- 

 portionately distributed on all four limbs ; and, as a rule, the 

 fore foot of one side not so far advanced as its fellow, and its 

 hind foot more to the front than the other hind foot. 



Aubin. [Eng.] A moderate gallop or canter. 



Averag'e Time. If the timers of a race catch the time 

 of a heat which is found to vary in comparison, the average 

 time taken is that which is usually hung out. 



Axle. The arm or spindle on which a wheel revolves, 

 or which forms the axis of the wheel and revolves with it. 

 The axle of a sulky, carriage or wagon wheel, is the round arm 

 of the axle-bar or axletree which is inserted in the nave or hub 

 of the wheel, but the name is frequently applied to the com- 

 plete axletree. Burgess, in his work on Coach Building, says 

 the commonest kind of an oil axle is called the mail, because 

 the peculiar mode of fastening was first used in the mail 

 coaches. Axle-bar — The bar of an axletree. Axle-box — The 

 box which contains the bearings for the arm of an axle ; the 

 bushing or metal lining of the hub which forms the rotatory 

 bearing of the axle of a sulky or carriage. Axle-socket. — A 

 section of seamless steel tubing in the ends of which are fitted 

 brass bushings made of interior dimensions of different sizes 

 to fit any make or size of axle, and to which is attached the 



