MISCELLANEA. 
706 
gard as unjust, since you with so much assurance affirm it to be 
so. I shall try again to procure, if it be but for a time, a copy of 
your master’s works, when it will become my pleasing duty to 
render justice to the merits of a man who must be confessed to 
be great, since you, so competent a judge, hold him in such high 
consideration.” 
MISCELLANEA. 
PREVENTION OF CRIB-BITING. 
Few of our readers are ignorant of the hitherto incurable de- 
fect of crib-biting in a horse, a practice so injurious in its effects 
to the constitution of the animal as to constitute legal unsound- 
ness. A crib-biter derives its name from seizing the manger or 
some other fixture with his teeth, arching his neck, and sucking 
in a quantity of air with a peculiar noise. This habit, which is 
common in young horses and those over-fed and under worked, 
is very infectious , and unless the offender is secluded all his 
companions, in a short time, curiously enough, become crib- 
biters. Patent muzzles, neck-irons, neck-straps, and various 
ingenious contrivances have been tried, but have been attended 
with very moderate success. Feeling the importance of some 
remedy for such an evil, our attention has been drawn to a very 
simple but efficacious cure. It has been discovered by Sir 
Peter Laurie, and is now in use at Sir Peter’s stables. Some 
months since, Sir Peter bought a valuable horse through a highly 
respectable dealer, Mr. Sheward, of Green-street, which was 
sold by his owner solely on account of his being an inveterate 
crib-biter; and who, for a time, set all means and appliances at 
defiance. But in order to arrive at some cure for so serious a 
defect in an otherwise valuable horse, Sir Peter directed that 
the space between the bottom of the back rack and the outer 
edge of the manger to be boarded over, forming a steep inclined 
plane, leaving in this way no edge or point on which the horfe 
can fix his bite. Attached is a flap or slide, open only at feeding 
time, so that then the manger is used as formerly. Mr. Field, 
the eminent veterinary surgeon, Captain Hall, the riding-master, 
and many other competent judges, have pronounced it a perfect 
cure ; as, indeed, it has been proved after the trial of some 
months. The expence of alteration is only a few shillings, and 
