PREPARATION PAST AND PRESENT. 78 
CHAPTER X. 
PREPARATION. 
Past and present methods of preparation contrasted—Sweating in old days; no 
longer necessary—My disuse of it—Its evils—Other practices happily 
abandoned—Other contrasts—Mr, Lawrence on preparation—Alteration in 
bridles—Sir Charles Bunbury’s method—Best season for preparation—Early 
preparation advocated—The preparation of the two-year-old described—The 
proper hours for exercise—Alternate rest and labour essential—The pre- 
paration of older horses—Danger of excessive work when unfit—Training for 
long and for short courses—The preparation of the yearling—My own and 
other methods—Clothing — Exercise in frost— Essential principles to be 
followed with horses of all ages—Should be commenced in time—Deceptive 
condition—A ppetite—The legs and feet—Final gallops—Precautions against 
cold—Exercise in wet weather ; and in fog—Curiously fatal result of exercising 
during fog—Sunday labour not necessary—Pleas for Sunday rest ; anecdote 
of the late Lord Ribblesdale—Tendency to accept new theories ; the Turkish 
bath. 
WE have seen how the yearling is broken in. It may perhaps 
lead to a clearer understanding of his subsequent preparation, 
and that of the older horse, if, as a preliminary, a brief com- 
parison be made of the salient features of the system in 
vogue to-day and that of some years ago. 
For one thing the old practice of sweating—the steady 
gallop of four miles under the excessive weight of two heavy 
rugs, a woollen breast-sweater and two hoods—is little heard 
of nowadays. Indeed the result is so weakening that the 
principle should have been abandoned long before it really 
was, especially as it is certain that the evil of it was 
