THE STABLE 75 



veterinarian's diary. Grease, glanders, and farcy, too, have 

 decreased in a like ratio. When any epizootic is raging, it 

 is always found to be most severe and intractable in crowded 

 stables. Thus when on board a transport during a storm, 

 the standings of some cavalry horses were of necessity 

 battened down, acute glanders immediately broke out 

 among them, and carried almost all of them off; the 

 principal cause of the mortality arising from their own 

 exhalations. With a full conviction, then, of the prime 

 necessity of rendering stables moderately warm, but yet 

 more of the importance of their thorough ventilation, 

 especially where the standings are numerous, we pass to 

 the general construction of a stable. 



Although stables have not always choice of situation and 

 aspect, these are often neglected where they are at command. 

 A south-eastern aspect for doors and windows is preferable ; 

 as dampness of the walls, too, is a fruitful cause of disorder, 

 some of the methods adopted in dwelling-houses are worth 

 consideration. Rising damp is a great generator of miasma, 

 and may be checked by a course of stone laid in cement, a 

 sheeting of zinc laid on thick plank, or in coal districts by 

 a quantity of coal ashes or dust, the least expensive of all. 

 This is for the footing of the outer wall. We need hardly 

 dwell on the advantages of a dry stable when the evils of a 

 damp one are so apparent ; coughs, swelled legs, a rough 

 staring coat that deiies the wisp and the hissing of the 

 groom, are its constant concomitants. In some cases a 

 stove-pipe passed through, or strewing the stables with 

 saw-dust or sand, may palliate the mischief. 



Nimrod recommends that there should be no more than 

 four stalls in a hunter's stable, and that these should have 

 three horses, being on one side only ; the centre partition 

 of two being removable, so as to make a loose box 12 feet 

 by 7 feet ; the stable itself 16 feet wide. A pair of carriage- 

 horses, in like manner, should have three stalls ; the spare 

 one will be found as useful as a spare bed in a house, in 

 case of emergency ; one of the partitions also shifting so as 

 to form a loose box for an invalid. Coach-horses, however, 

 are generally in a double row, which takes a general width 

 of 20 feet from wall to wall. Each stall 6 feet 6 inches to 

 7 feet, by 6 feet wide. Large cart-horses will need yet 

 more room. 



The walls should be stone or brick, the latter the best 



