26 STABLE MANAGEMENT. 
From the above remarks, it appears horses were fed in 
olden times pretty much as they are fed now. Indeed 
with the exception of wheat, barley, and malt, which should 
only be given in illness, his recommendations leave little 
to be desired with regard to the food. 
The manner and times of feeding and the food itself 
having been described, it should not be forgotten that 
equal attention should be paid to watering at stated periods. 
And here something may aptly be said on the quality of 
water best suited to the horse. 
Rain-water is preferable to all others, and where this 
cannot always be procured and kept fresh in tanks, well 
or pond-water, softened if hard with a little wheat flour 
or chalk, may supply its place. From the use of either 
so treated I have seen no ill effects. Mr. Clark in his 
treatise on the horse, thinks water of so much importance 
to the well-being of the animal, that he has devoted a ‘ 
whole chapter of fifteen pages to its consideration, the 
salient points of which I think well to give: 
“Disease may originate,” he says, “from the use of un- 
wholesome water, and physicians are of the same opinion 
as regards the human subject; for where the water is bad, 
disease prevails most. Horses do not thrive well on pit 
or well-water, as the water is very hard, and causes the coat 
to stare and stand on end. If taken immediately after it 
is newly pumped, spring water is likely to partake of all 
the metallic or mineral strata through which it passes, and 
is salutary or noxious according to the nature of those 
substances. River-water is much the same, but it is softer 
than water that runs underground and better for use. Well- 
or pit-water is worse than spring; being harder; and the 
deeper the well the worse the water. Pond-water, under 
which head may be included all stagnant waters generally 
