OF 





THE DAILY LIFE OF OUR FAR^M. ' 47 



his patient was worse, and that he had found out it was 

 something in the hind-leg, and not a "touch of the, kid- 

 neys" as he suggested last| night, when he begged 

 vainly for a diuretic dose. He had had the forethought 

 to have the boiler filled with water, and a quantity of 

 mallow leaves thrown in, should fomentation be directed. 

 The bull was down, and couldn't rise for some time. At 

 last he did, and there were clear indications of a sprained 

 hock. I had feared " black-quarter " as I hurried on 

 with the lad. Now, the buckets of hot-water were 

 brought, and an old horse-rug torn up, soaked, and 

 applied steaming, until he soon began to shrink and 

 notice. " Can't I go to the doctor, sir, and get some- 

 thing to make him eat ? " " Eat be bothered ; do you 

 think you'd care for your broth if you were in the pain 

 that he is in ? Just stick to the bathing." We could 

 not manage to tie the rug round the hock, as the least 

 uneasy movement of his huge muscles shifted it. At 

 last he lay down, unluckily upon the wrong side, and 

 then, silly thing ! began groaning piteously at the 

 superfluous pain he gave himself by so doing. I just 

 touched the tender part of his thigh behind with the 

 boiling-hot liquor, and an instinctive wince brought the 

 limb released to the position we wanted. 



I send the lad to his dinner and take his place 

 awhile, most industriously keeping up the fomenta- 

 tion. I didn't quite enjoy it, 1 must own, in that old 

 cow-house, with masses of dusty ancestral cob-web 

 swaying over-head, such as a wine-merchant would be 

 delighted to have grown along his cellar-ceiling. One 

 bovine companion groaning on this side, another half- 

 snoring drowsily on that, the white cat coiled up in the 

 hay, the Irish muck-spreader nodding in the root-house, 



