54 NICKING. 



7th. His food should be easy of digestion, light 

 and cool, such as bran, oats, or green food of any kind. 

 If the root of the tail should be inflamed, (which is very 

 often the case after pulleying,) or should small biles 

 appear, apply a little tincture of myrrh, copperas, or 

 blue-stone water. It very often happens, that the 

 hair in the tail of a nicked horse shows a disposition 

 to drop, w^hich should be prevented, by washing the 

 tail in sharp vinegar, and keeping it nice and clean 

 with soap-suds. The matter discharged from the 

 wounds, if permitted to remain amongst the hair for 

 twenty-four hours, will take it off as readily as a 

 knife. It is of very great importance to prevent this, 

 as the best nicked horse in the world will look ugly, if 

 he has little or no hair in his tail ; besides, it generally 

 takes twelve months to replace it. 



Horses are sometimes nicked, when their blood is 

 in a bad state, which is the cause of their tails swelling 

 and showing marks of violent inflammation ; to remove 

 which, it will be only necessary to bleed plentifully, 

 and apply a poultice made of a strong decoction of red 

 oak bark and corn meal 



If this operation should be performed in a season 

 of the year when flies are troublesome, the tail and 

 buttocks of the horse should be anointed with stur- 

 geon's oil, which will effectually remove them. 



I shall now proceed to describe the third and best 

 mode of nicking every description of horses; and 

 which, if well attended to, will seldom or never fail to 

 succeed. 



1st. The stall, pulleys, halter, and manger, should 

 all be prepared for the reception of a horse, previous 

 to being nicked, as directed in the engraving pre- 

 fixed. The pulleys {figure 2) about six or eight feet 



