THE FETLOCKS. 21 



bly find he has been slightly fired. At other times 

 the hair will look of a lighter colour ; when, if you 

 get him in a proper light, you will probably find he 

 has been blistered. Ask the reason, and you will be 

 told, he was fired for nothing, just as a preventive ; 

 or if blistered, merely for fun. Look on these as 

 screws, and deduct at least seventy per cent, in con- 

 sequence ; for a man who is cruel enough to fire for 

 nothing, or to blister for fun, will not hesitate to palm 

 off on you a bad and patched-up leg.* 



The small scars, or shortened hair from cutting, 

 either behind or at the sides of the fetlocks, are easily 

 seen. If cutting arises from the toes turning too 

 much out, it is, of course, incurable, for " a goose will 

 always go like a goose," and it renders a horse much 

 more unsaleable than a loss of hair from girthgall or 

 sore back, both of which are looked on as most seri- 

 ous objections, as, the hair once off, the spot is so 

 easily galled again, that the horse has frequently to 

 be laid up every other month. 



At the inner side of the fetlock, as often as the out- 

 side, there is sometimes, in the otherwise cleanest legs, 

 an ossification. t I have seen this twice passed over 



* Some sporting novices say, a fired leg is worth two others ; it never goes. 

 A fired leg, it is true, will often stand training when its fellow fails ; the rea- 

 son is plain : the horse favours the fired leg, and the other one has to stand the 

 extra work ; consequently, the good leg goes first, but the bad one has caused 

 it ; besides, there is good authority on record, that a leg never moves so freely 

 after having been fired. It is astonishing how much a horse can favour a leg, 

 without its being noticed by ordinary observers; and it has been remarked that 

 ladies' horses generally fail in the near fore-leg first : these dear creatures al- 

 ways must have the horse lead with the off-leg, therefore it does not get its fair 

 share of the stress, though the foot may get more battering. 



t This enlargement is sometimes caused by displacement of the sesamoid 

 bones, in which case it invariably causes lameness when the horse is put to 

 any thing like hard work. ED. 



