A STAGGERING FACT. 123 



change were frequently attacked by staggers, but 

 he hardly recollected one instance of its occurrence 

 elsewhere on the whole line of road : yet here scarce 

 a week passed without a case occurring. This, 

 of course set me thinkingr : it was not that the 

 coach loaded particularly heavily over this seven- 

 teen miles of ground, nor could it be the nature of 

 the two stages, as to pace, for one was a very hilly, 

 slow ten-mile stage, the other a dead flat-galloping 

 seven-mile ; the horses were a fair average of the 

 rest, and in average condition, the stable neither 

 too hot nor too cold. As I intended stopping at this 

 change all night, and the coachman waited here 

 to take the up-coach, I had him in, to question 

 him further on the subject of the staggers. I 

 then learned what he thought to be still more 

 extraordinary to be the case, namely, that over 

 either ground both he and his brother coachman 

 had found that the same horses that were so often 

 attacked were always so in going from this par- 

 ticular change, but never in returning to it. This 

 at once threw a light on the matter : it must be 

 their treatment the twenty-three hours they were 

 in this particular stable. I saw the horses treated 

 the whole evening quite properly, and the same 

 early in the morning ; but going into the stable 

 about two hours before time for putting on the 

 harness, I found the horsekeeper cramming the 

 hay into their racks as if he was provisioning 



