CATTLE AND HORSE INSURANCE. 
627 
Professor Dick, in a letter with which he has favoured Mr. 
Youatt on this subject, says, “ I am induced to think that, after six 
or seven years old, there is a great chance of their being free from 
all disease. A horse, with ordinary care and good usage, will live 
until he is twenty or twenty-five. Many live ten or fifteen years 
after that, and continue to do very fair work ; but, in my opinion, 
the average of what I have mentioned will be about twenty or 
twenty-five. 
Blood-stallions will, I think, reach twenty-five; but I do not think 
that cart stallions will reach so much, as they are more frequently 
cut off by acute diseases, arising from improper management. 
I think brood-mares will reach about twenty-five years. 
The most common diseases in farm horses are those of the bowels, 
inflammation and cholic, arising from overloading the stomach by 
too large a feed after too long fasting. In a large farm, about nine 
miles distant, twelve horses were lost in one year from improper 
feeding; and in a letter which I bad lately from one of the brothers 
— there are two brothers in the farm — he mentions the fact, that 
since they had adopted my suggestions, with regard to the divi- 
sion of labour and the mode of feeding, they have not lost a horse 
from those causes, during, I think, from four to five years. Diseases 
of the bowels are, on the whole, the most common and the most fatal. 
There are some situations in which diseases of the lungs prevail 
much, especially in particular seasons. 
Farms most exposed to easterly winds, and more particularly 
without shelter on the sea-shore, or in small valleys where a cur- 
rent from the east blows, or on a hill-side, or stables in any situation 
where they are exposed to east, north, or west winds, are very 
liable to have disease of the lungs produced in seasons when these 
winds prevail. The opening into stables ought always to be on 
the south or west. The north and the east are the worst. 
Young horses are most liable to strangles or diseases of the 
organs of respiration ; and these diseases are most fatal at the age 
of from three to five years. After six or seven, the risk dimi- 
nishes; and it will be found that few horses actually die of old 
age after they are ten or twelve years old. Their limbs are 
worn out before their general life and health are impaired, and at 
a proper value according to the age, there is little risk, in my 
opinion, if continued at the work they have been accustomed to 
and experiencing the same general treatment. 
As I have already stated, I have no proper data, and therefore 
cannot say at what rate insurances should be made. 
[We regard these records as exceedingly valuable, and shall be 
thankful for any similar ones with which our correspondents will 
favour us. — Y.] 
