146 THE HORSE 



market. For the fashion in draft horses has im- 

 proved of late years and the fancy teams that we 

 see in the cities are more trappy in their move- 

 ments and look more like horses and less like pigs 

 or elephants than those of a few years ago. 



It is the fashion to have draft horses excessively 

 fat when offered for sale in the market. So uni- 

 versal is this custom that there seems to be no 

 help for it, though it is greatly to be deplored. 

 It serves no good purpose, as far as the use of the 

 horse is concerned, for this soft fat, which is put 

 on when the horse is idle or practically so, must 

 all be worked off and good, hard flesh worked on 

 before he is of much use for hard service. It 

 also conceals, to some extent, bad points in con- 

 formation, and a pair of horses that are quite 

 deficient in good points, if only of large size and 

 closely matched, will, if excessively fat, often sell 

 very well in the market. 



This is not as encouraging as it might be for 

 the man who is taking pains to raise good ones, 

 but he may console himself with the fact that, 

 however good a disguise fat may be, no amount of 

 it can make a poorly put up horse look quite as 

 well as one that is well formed and " horsey." 

 Nor can he, any more than his competitors, afford 

 to despise such factitious aids as may make his 

 horses sell better; condition, grooming, close 



