34: DOMESTIC ANIMALS. 



which nature designed them to have, in a manner prepared 

 for them by some unknown influence of the atmosphere, as 

 well as by the deposition of many saline admixtures. 



The difference between hard and soft water is known to 

 every one. There is nothing in which the different effect of 

 hard and soft water is so evident as in the stomach and di- 

 gestive organs of the horse. Hard water drawn fresh from the 

 well will assuredly make the coat of a horse unaccustomed to 

 it stare, and it will not unfrequently gripe and otherwise injure 

 him. He is injured, however, not so much by the hardness of 

 the well-water as by its coldness particularly by its coldness 

 in summer, and when it is in many degrees below the tempera- 

 ture of the atmosphere. The water in the brook and the 

 pond being warmed by long exposure to the air, as well as 

 having become soft, the horse drinks freely of it without danger. 



If the horse were watered three times a day, and especially 

 in summer, he would often be saved from the sad torture of 

 thirst, and from many a disease. "Whoever has observed the 

 eagerness with which the over-worked horse, hot and tired, 

 plunges his muzzle into the pail, and the difficulty of stop- 

 ping him until he has drained the last drop, may form some 

 idea of what he had previously suffered, and will not won- 

 der at the violent spasms, and inflammation, and sudden 

 death that often result. There is a prejudice in the minds of 

 many persons against the horse being fully supplied with water. 

 They think that it injures his wind, and disables him for quick 

 and hard work. If he is galloped, as he too often is, immedi- 

 ately after drinking, his wind may be irreparably injured ; but 

 if he were oftener suffered to satiate his thirst at the intervals 

 of rest he would be happier and better. It is a fact unsuspect- 

 ed by those who have not carefully observed the horse, that 

 if he has frequent access to water he will not drink so much 

 in the course of the day as another will do, who, to cool his 

 parched mouth, swallows as fast as he can and knows not 

 when to stop. 



On a journey a horse should be liberally supplied with 



