960 VETEEINAEY HYGIENE 



out the machine, and some of them wear out very quickly. 

 Where important miUtary operations depend upon a certain 

 movement being made at all costs, the results must com- 

 pensate for the sacrifice ; but it is within the knowledge of 

 history that enormous efiforts have been demanded from 

 horses not followed by any useful result, for when the 

 psychological moment arrived the horses were done up. 

 For example, at the Battle of Borodino the charges of the 

 French cavalry against the Eussians were executed at a slow 

 trot. Some of the most important results in a campaign 

 may be entirely lost through an inability to reap the effects 

 of victory. If artillery prepare the way for victory, and 

 infantry win it, it is cavalry that collect its fruits, and con- 

 summate the destruction. If cavalry are so exhausted they 

 can move no quicker than infantry, the defeat of an enemy 

 becomes a carefully carried-out dignified retirement instead 

 of a rout, and the whole process will again have to be 

 repeated. 



There is a great art in skilfully throwing away lives 

 whether of men or horses ; it is part of the extremely rough 

 game of war, and has to be faced. It is not this which 

 produces the loss of horses in war, but the inexcusable 

 wastage which occurs under subordinate commanders ; 

 galloping when a quiet canter would suffice, trotting when 

 the work could easily be done at a walk ; failing to dismount 

 the men at every available opportunity ; failing to make 

 them walk in order to ease their horses' backs ; failing to 

 take every opportunity for watering and feeding the animals. 



It is perfectly simple in a very few hours to exhaust 

 horses on these lines ; when we speak of the loss of horses 

 in war, how few realize the enormous control the junior 

 officers can effect in this direction, by bearing in mind 



(1) that a horse is not a machine but living flesh and blood, 



(2) that every cavalry horse is carrying a weight which is 

 not represented by one man but by very nearly two ! 



It may be stated as a general rule (to which there 

 are exceptions), that no horse or mule in the army which 

 is not under the eye of an officer receives any care, and 



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