38 AMERICAN STABLE GUIDE. 



perhaps, like the exotic or hot-house plant, would succumb 

 to the inexorable law of nature, when by accident or other- 

 wise they were exposed to the frosts and chilling blasts of 

 December. In winter, the temperature of the stable for 

 safety and comfort to the horses when out-doors, should 

 not exceed 40° to 50° of Fahrenheit's thermometer. 



But the groom will say the coats on the horses will not 

 lie well. "What of that, when it is a provision of nature 

 to give them a coat for protection ? and moreover, in win- 

 ter horses are even more able to do their work with the 

 long coat of hair on, than they are with the short and 

 glossy one in summer. The greater the heat of the stable 

 in winter, the more tender will the horses be, and conse- 

 quently the greater the liability to disease. But in our 

 desire to avoid unnecessary exposure of the horse, care 

 should be taken not to have the temperature too low ; 

 for then the horses will lose condition, and consume more 

 food to keep them in flesh or working order and to supply 

 the caloric of the body required in a greater degree when 

 exposed or stabled in too low a temperature. 



The risk of disease being produced in horses by sudden 

 transition from heat to cold, is by no means so great in 

 summer as the sudden exposure to the cold from the heated 

 stable in winter; bearing in mind, however, that from cold 

 to heat is as prolific in the production of disease as the 

 reverse. But as we have said, the risk is not so great in 

 summer, from the difficulty or almost impossibility of find- 

 ing a situation in mid-summer, except it be in a draught 



