110 ESSAYS ON HORSE SUBJECTS 



districts of this country is wasted. Not only is 

 this so, but a positive injury is inflicted on the 

 horses that consume it. It is, of course, true that 

 horses, for the purposes of perfect digestion, re- 

 quire a certain amount of bulky food. Sufficient 

 nutritious matter can be supplied in concentrated 

 form, but digestion would not go on properly 

 without a certain amount of bulk. Volume of 

 feed is essential to insure the proper activity of 

 the digestive tract. 



There is a limit, however, to the bulk required, 

 and if this limit is much exceeded, there is not 

 only a waste of food, but injury is done. If a 

 horse is constantly being fed too large a volume 

 of feed, it overworks and overtaxes the digestive 

 organs, soon weakening these organs and conse- 

 quently rendering them more liable to indiges- 

 tion, colic, stoppage and diarrhoea. Even if no 

 such evidence of acute disorder shows itself, as 

 the affections named, the unnecessarily dis- 

 tended bowels encroach upon the chest capacity 

 and interfere with the action of the lungs ; so that 

 the horse cannot stand as much exertion as he 

 might otherwise. One likes to see a horse with 

 a good depth of rib, and well ribbed-up and not 

 presenting a tucked-up condition, all of which is 

 evidence of a good feeder. But no horse, unless 

 it is a mare in foal, or one running at grass, 

 should show what is called a "pot-belly," as that 



