Horses. 6^ 



after fairly well, his health is cared for, he is usually well 

 fed, and horses used for private purposes are seldom over- 

 worked. But there is a remarkable absence of sentiment 

 in all this, which is proved by the facility with which, in 

 most European countries, men sell their horses, often for 

 bodily infirmities or imperfections, in which there is no 

 question of temper, and especially by the custom of selling 

 a horse which has done faithful service, merely because 

 he is getting old and weaker than when in his prime. 

 This last custom proves the absence of sentiment, the 

 more completely that every one knows when selling an 

 old horse that he is dooming him to harder work and 

 worse keep, and that the certain fate of a horse which 

 we part with because he is old, is a descent to harder and 

 harder conditions, till finally he is worked to death in a 

 cab, or in a cart belonging to some master little less mis- 

 erable than himself. 



The whole subject of the relation between the horse 

 and his master depends upon the customs which regulate 

 our life, and which have regulated the lives of our fore- 

 fathers, in all sorts of other ways. We are not enough 

 with our horses to educate either their intelligence or their 

 affections ; and as there has been the same separation in 

 preceding centuries, the horse has inherited a way of 

 regarding men which scarcely tends to make their rela- 

 tion more intimate. There are a few exceptional cases 

 in which traces of affection are distinctly perceptible in 

 horses, but by far the greater number of them are either 

 indifferent, or decidedly hostile to humanity. Man loves 

 the horse, at least some men love him, from feelings of 

 gratitude and pride. When your horse has carried you 

 well in battle, or on the hunting-field, you are grateful to 

 him for the exercise of his strength and courage in your 



