PREFACE. 



As an owner of horses and dogs, and later as a student, 

 practitioner, and teacher of veterinary medicine, the author has 

 constantly regretted the poverty of practical books on the 

 domestic animals, and has felt the want of accurate text-books 

 on many of the ordinary subjects concerning them. Upon the 

 age of the domestic animals there exist in English but incom- 

 plete and scattered writings ; the best of them by writers of 

 the first half of the century, which have only been supplemented 

 in later years by short compends, or the publication of charts of 

 variable merit, with but a small amount of descriptive matter. 



The author has attempted to prepare such a book as he 

 feels would have been of interest and service to himself in his 

 association with animals as a layman, and would have aided his 

 studies and appreciation of the anatomy of the teeth, dentition, 

 and the means of determining the age. He hopes, also, that 

 this work will furnish, to students and veterinarians, knowledge 

 whi^h will aid in surgical operations on the mouth. 



In French, German, and Italian the literature upon this 

 subject is much more complete, and the articles in these lan- 

 guages are much better illustrated ; so that the author has drawn 

 freely in quotations and translations from the list of writers 

 found in the appended Bibliography, and has used many illus- 

 trations where he has not believed that new drawings would be 

 an improvement upon the older ones. He wishes to recognize 



(V) 



