350 RESEARCHES INTO THE CAUSES OF BLINDNESS 
would scarcely have been possible to have made a worse choice, 
for the stallions are larger and fatter than the mares, and, like 
them, are predisposed to blindness. 
In the neighbourhood of Sarreguemines and Bitche, there is 
another breed of horses, brought from Bavaria, or arising from a 
cross between the Bavarian mares and stallions from the Rosiere 
stud. 
The tout-ensemble of these horses is agreeable, especially at first 
sight ; the head is short — the jaw rather large — the eyes brilliant 
and well placed — the whole physiognomy betokens oriental blood — 
the hair is fine and silky — the withers well developed — the loins 
short — croup straight- — tail well put on — sides round — chest open — 
the play of the shoulder in general not sufficiently developed. The 
only fault that can be found with these horses is, that there is not 
sufficient amplitude in the articulations of the limbs — the hams in 
particular are too narrow, and the hollow almost effaced. They 
compensate, however, for these defects by being capable of a great 
deal of work, especially when well fed and attended to. These 
horses are not so common as the two breeds first described. 
Secondly : However much all the breeds of horses in the district 
of Sarraguemines are deteriorated, they still preserve some remains 
of excellence, which prove how much they would be susceptible of 
amendment were a better system of treatment introduced; but 
what can be expected from a breed where neither care nor system 
is adhered to in regard to its reproduction 1 Not the slightest at- 
tention is paid to the choice either of mares or stallions. Some- 
times the connexion takes place in the pasturages where animals 
of both sexes are turned out together. Sometimes those miserable 
stallions so often met with in small villages are employed ; and, at 
other times, the mares are put to half-bred unsound stallions that 
happen to be brought through the place, and which, nine times out 
of ten, are too large and too heavy. 
If the breeder attends little to the amelioration of his horses in 
the coupling of the animals, he bestows even less care during the 
period of pregnancy. When in this state the mare is not in the 
least better treated than at other times ; she is worked the same 
and fed the same, and at a time when she requires rest and good 
nourishment, and the more especially because the females are 
made to breed in their third year, at a period at which all these 
organs attain their greatest degree of development, and when the 
assimilatory functions are most endowed with strength and energy. 
To crown the whole, the owner forgets that the poor animal bears 
in its womb a parisitical being, and only feeds it on a scanty al- 
lowance of food — -some bad, or at any rate very mediocre — hay, 
bran, clover, and lucern resulting from crops that have failed, and 
