No. 144.] 361 



fancy, to be assigned to a plaee with the fabulous Centaurus. So, 

 when science breathes upon it, the frost work of fancy becomes 

 but drops of water. 



But when cattle are hid in a stable, the reverse of all this is 

 equally true. If they cannot take exercise, the stable must be 

 made warm. If they are left to shiver in open stalls, it is true 

 that the temperature of their bodies remains at blood heat, for 

 life cannot vary far from this point, but the corresponding six- 

 teenth of nitrogenized matters accumulates somewhere in an 

 inflammation j that is, they take cold. 



If a horse is confined to the stable and fed what grain he will 

 eat, and given what water he will drink from a pail, in a little- 

 while he becomes diseased, stiif in his joints, he has got the gout 

 or the rheumatism, or something else, from high living or defi- 

 ciency of exercise. 



If supplied with a choice of food, oats, hay, buckwheat, carrots, 

 salt, and water, the instinct of the horse will direct him as the 

 same faculty does man, to the kind of food, best calculated to sup- 

 ply the waste of his system. 



From these considerations we see why some of the best stock 

 growers prefer to allow colts to run in the yard, and why turning 

 grain damaged horses out on the dung heap, has been a favorite 

 idea with farmers. It is true, that large framed and more power- 

 ful animals may be raised in this manner, although at a greater 

 expense. 



Not only should the stable be warm, but it must be light. The 

 eyes of horses bathed in a solution of ammonia, and kept in dark- 

 ness, are in just the condition to take on inflammation, when 

 suddenly brought out into the dust and wind and glare of the 

 sun, and irritated by the increase of circulation, incident to a 

 drive. Little attention is frequently paid to the inflammation, if 

 it is even noticed, and, instead of being put on hay feed, and al- 

 lowed to rest, the horse is driven until the deposition of fibrin 

 gives the eye a milky appearance, which is popularly believed to 

 be a " film," a kind of skin that must be got off, by blowing some- 



