VENTILATION OF STABLES. 43 



of its use. In f\ict, they regarded it as highly pernicious, and 

 did all they could to exclude it. In those times, the groom 

 shut up his stable at night, and was careful to close every 

 aperture by which a breath of fresh air might fnid admission. 

 The keyhole and the threshold of the door were not forgotten. 

 The horse was confined all night in a sort of hothouse, and 

 in the morning the groom was delighted to find his stable 

 warm as an oven. He did not perceive, or he did not notice, 

 that the air was bad, charged with moisture, and with vapors 

 more pernicious than moisture. It was oppressively warm, 

 and that was enough for him. He knew nothing about its 

 vitiation, or about its influence upon the horse's health. In a 

 large crowded stable, where the horses were in constant and 

 laborious work, there would be much disease. Glanders, 

 grease, mange, blindness, coughs, and broken wind, would 

 prevail, varied occasionally by fatal inflammations. In 

 another stable, containing fewer horses, and those doing little 

 work, the principal diseases would be sore throats, bad eyes, 

 swelled legs, and inflamed lungs, or frequent invasions of the 

 influenza. l^ut evervthino- on earth would be blamed for 

 these before a close stable. 



Since 178S, when Clarke's work was published, there has 

 been a constant outcry against hot, foul stables. Every 

 veteriTi: r/ writer who has had to treat of diseases, has blamed 

 the Iwt sfa!)les for producing at least one half of them. So 

 far as tht- influence of these writers has extended, they have 

 produced some effect. A ventilated stable is not now a won- 

 der ; tnaiiy are properly aired, and many more bear witness 

 that veiitiliition has been attempted though not effected. Farm 

 stables are, in general, pretty well aired, and it is probable 

 they always were so. Carelessness is to be thanked for that. 

 Apertures which admit air are there by accident. The cavalry 

 stables used to be shamefully close. Before veterinary sur- 

 geons were appointed to the army, ignorance had leave to 

 practise all its tricks. Professor Coleman introduced a system 

 of ventilation which must have saved the government many 

 thousands of pounds every year. Like many other salutary 

 innovations, it was at first strongly resisted. Much evil was 

 predicted ; but diseases which used to destroy whole troops 

 are now scarcely known in the army. 



Much has been said and written about ventilation, and a 

 good deal has been done to produce it in places where till 

 lately it was never thought of. But still very many stables 

 continue to be badly ventilated. The blame belongs chiefly 



