BONES. 7 



should be of strong and compact texture. It has been 

 customary to state, in a vague way, that the bones of Arab 

 horses and Enghsh thoroughbreds are denser than those of 

 other breeds. It would, however, be more exact to say that 

 the drier the soil on which a horse has been bred and 

 brought up, and the "harder" the food upon which he has 

 been fed, the better will be the quality of his bone ; for we 

 find that in dry, hot climates in the East, native ponies, which 

 can have little or no admixture of Arab blood, have legs as 

 clean and hard as any that are to be met with in the Desert. 

 We need not test our theories on this subject by the micro- 

 scope, or by determining the specific gravity of various 

 sections of bone taken from different animals ; for we can 

 obtain a far more reliable and practical proof from the fact 

 that, other things being equal, the more porous are bones, 

 the more liable are they to bony deposits, such as splints, 

 spavins, and ringbones. I here purposely omit to add "sore 

 shins ; " for this disease is almost peculiar to immature 

 thoroughbreds that are put into training at an age much 

 earlier than that at which ordinary horses are broken. The 

 nature of a horse's hoofs, which can always be determined 

 by inspection, or by using the "drawing knife," will generally 

 afford us a safe guide by which to judge of the quality of his 

 bone. Thus we find that animals which have been reared 

 amid damp surroundings and on soft food, will, as a rule, be 

 prone to bony enlargements, and will have flat feet of soft 

 horn. We cannot fail to notice this if we compare the horses 

 of the English fen counties with those bred on high, dry land. 

 In Australia we see the same difference between the horses 

 of the damp Swan River Settlement, and those of the 

 comparatively dry climate of New South Wales ; in India, 



