4 HORSE MANAGEMENT IN INDIA 



North- West, Oudh, and the Punjab, have retained their 

 health and condition during the hot weather quite as well 

 as they did during the cold months. 



In order that the stable should be kept as dry as pos- 

 sible, its walls should be constructed of some material 

 which will not absorb moisture, such as fire-burnt bricks 

 or stone, the former being, I think, the better material. 

 Wood, also, might be employed, though stables made of it 

 are not nearly so cool during the hot weather as those 

 constructed of either of the other two. Throughout 

 Eastern Bengal the walls are made of strong bamboo 

 screens, which serve their purpose admirably. In such a 

 stall a kicker may be saved from injuring himself by 

 placing matting (Hind, cliitai), say, 3 ft. high, about 6 in. 

 from the wall, while the interval may be filled up with 

 dry grass, which will give to the blow and act as a pad- 

 ding to the wall. 



Tlie floors of the stable should, if possible, be laid down 

 with some material which will not absorb water. An 

 admirable flooring for stables, whether in India, England, 

 or elsewhere, is one of thick wooden planks, so arranged 

 that the urine of the horse may drain through the inter- 

 stices between them, on a waterproof surface. These 

 planks may be about 9 in. broad and 3 in. thick, and 

 should be placed so that they can be readily removed, and 

 the under floor cleansed. I observed in the Durban 

 Tramway Company's stables (Natal) a good arrangement, 

 by which a waterproof drain — the width of which was 

 equal to the length of each stall — of slightly curved shape 

 ran underneath each long line of stalls, the planks which 

 formed the flooring being made to fit accurately across it 



