PARTUEITION. 575 



passed out. The attachment of the impregnated ovum to the 

 uterus is followed by a series of developments ending in a foetus, 

 covered with membranous envelopes, the outermost and toughest 

 of which, the chorion, resembles the skin of an egg, and is 

 adapted to the shape of the uterus ; the amnion within it contains 

 the foetus. The allantois is a double membrane covering the 

 amnion with one reflection and the chorion with the other, the 

 umbilical cord attaching the foetus to the enveloping membranes, 

 and ramifying into the placental tufts. If the growth and deve- 

 lopment goes on uninterruptedly the foal should be dropped in 

 about eleven months from the time of copulation, but there are 

 plenty of instances in which apparently well-developed foals have 

 been but ten months in utero, and of others, equally healthy, born 

 twelve and a half months from the time the mare was first stinted. 

 The majority are dropped between the 340th and 350th day. The 

 long records sometimes put forward are generally to be accounted 

 for by several servings, only the last of which was successful, while 

 the time has been reckoned from the first covering. 



The proportion of foals born alive to mares stinted may roughly 

 be put at 65 per cent., a variety of reasons for abortion and 

 sterility accounting for the rest. 



Working mares are more apt to conceive than the fat and idle, 

 Tvhile a working stallion will often succeed in impregnating mares 

 ^which have proved barren to several successive sires ; this is one 

 of the reasons why fanners use an indifferent sire in their own 

 neighbourhood, instead of a high-priced animal who leaves no 

 foals behind him. The method of trying a mare over a gate, and 

 the conclusions arrived at, are not always reliable, as in the case 

 of a mare I had, and for whom a suitable sire could not be found, _ 

 tiU chancing to meet a friend's cob, I took my mare out of harness 

 and got her covered in a neighbour's barn, much against her will, 

 with the result that she brought me a splendid foal, and seven days 

 afterwards conceived to another horse. The ninth day after foal- 

 ing is very generally agreed to be the most successful time for 

 impregnation, and the case mentioned is to show how great a 

 departure from the received traditions of breeders is yet consistent 

 with impregnation. This little mare never at any time showed 

 the ordinary signs of being in use, on both occasions resented 

 the visit of the sire, was at no other time stinted, yet proved a 

 most jealous mother and brought up both foals. The mere fact of^ 

 a stallion coming through the village was the sole reason of her 

 being served on the seventh day. 



During pregnancy the menlbrane called the amnion becomes dis- 

 tended with fluid, and acts as a water cushion to the foetus, with- 

 out which comparatively slight blows and falls would account for 



