( 237 ) 
Farming of Oxfordshire. By Claue Sewell Read. 
Prize Eeport, — Part II. 
• The farm-lioises of this county are generally inferior animals. 
A stranger may not be unfavourably impressed with the appear- 
ance of the horse stock. Most farmers have a road-team — fat 
and well-favoured, and four of these horses proceed to market 
with an insignificant load of corn. Thirty years ago there were 
many more of these lusty, good horses here than in the present 
day. Tlie plough teams, which are left at home, will not bear 
inspection, as most of the horses have great heads, big hairy 
legs, and no length of carcass ; they have a dull heavy tread, 
no pluck, and little strength. The horses all the year round go 
to work at 7 and leave off at 3. This is a bad practice ; the 
evil doubtless oiiginated in having open field lands so far from 
home. And it must be confessed that many farm steadings are 
so badly situated, being in the village at one end of the occupa- 
tion, that the outside land is sometimes two miles distant from 
the stable. In the short days of winter, with dark mornings and 
evenings, it may be ver};^ Avell not to stop to bait. Horses are 
seldom overworked at that time of the year, and may perform 
their easy tasks with comfort ; but in the hot days of summer, 
and in tlie busy season of seed-time, when the strength of a 
horse is taxed to the uttermost, it is surely necessary to divide 
the hours of labour. We are told in the Society's Journal that 
6 hours is too long for horses to work without food. If 6 hours 
be too long surely 8 is worse. The small stomach of the 
horse is evidently not adapted nor intended for protracted fasts. 
When at liberty he will spend more than three-fourths of his 
time in eating. Some humane persons may think it quite as 
objectionable that the carters and boys should be so long without 
food ; but the ploughmen, about 11 o'clock, pause for lunch, 
and, while work is intermitted for a quarter of an hour, the horses 
stand shivering in the wintry wind or broiling in the summer 
sun, as the case may be. If no obvious injury is produced by 
this system as its immediate consequence, its tendency and its 
ulterior effects are pernicious, inasmuch as it predisposes the 
constitution to disease and accelerates the period of old age. 
The amount of corn allowed to cart-horses in winter varies with 
the work they have to perform. Most commonly it is a bushel 
of oats with a little hay, and abundance of corn-chaff. Some 
good farmers allow their horses no hay at all in the dead months 
VOL. XV. R 
