144 DADD’S VETERINAh: mmvitinu AND SURGERY. 
regards horses, they form no exception to this peculiarity. We 
aright introduce evidence, convincing and positive, of their ability 
te endure the privations of hunger, and, at the same time, :now 
that they suffer but little from its effects. A single case will serve 
to illustrate this. We once treated a case of tetanus (lock-jaw). 
‘Lhe subject never tasted food during a period of sixtcen days; on 
the seventeenth the masseters relaxed, and the faculty cf swallow- 
ing returned. At this period we might suppose him to be * hungry 
as a bear,” yet, on offering him a few oats, he did not appear to be 
very ravenous, and partook of food subsequently offered him as if 
nothing hed happened. These are extreme casen, yet they go to 
show that there is no cause for alarm because a horse happens to 
be “off his feed” once in awhile. Such condition may ultimately 
prove salutary, affording the stomach and its associates time to rest 
from their herculean labors. 
The fact that most of our adult horses get more food than they 
need has been demonstrated by analysis of their excrement, whick 
nas been found to contain a large amount of nutritious materia. 
over and above what the animals actually need. We can develop 
the gormandizing powers of very many horses, by placing before 
tnem, from day to day, more than they require. Their appetites, 
like some of ours, are not proof against temptation ; and the digcs- 
tive organs may be trained to dispose of twice the quantity of food 
actually needed, and the habit, at first acquired, becomes perma- 
ment, and the creature is known as a voracious feeder—a glutton 
Hence, through indiscretions of this character, we can augment 
both function and capacity of stomach. We remember examining 
the stomach of a horse, the property of a baker, who was in the 
habit of feeding the former on brown bread. The animal died of 
chronic indigestion, and his stomach exceeded in capacity that of 
two ordinary Lurses. Great care, therefore, is requisite in regard 
co the proper feeding of horses; for, in their domesticated state, 
they have lost those natural instincts which serve to inform the 
untamed animal of the necessary amount of food which his system 
needs, and they are in the condition of a thoughtless child that 
will eat al] day, and, on retiring to bed, will crave und ery for 
more. 
Our readers have probably heard of the gormandiziag propensi- 
ties of natives in the arctic regions. Some of them think nothing 
cf bolting down twenty pounds of meat and oil per day, and 
