240 REVIEW — THE HORSE IN HEALTH AND DISEASE. 
fifth year, or even later. This practice, by removing the weight 
of hair which tended to press down the tail during the colt’s growth, 
has the effect of improving its permanent position, and giving rise, 
in the course of many generations, to a slight deviation from the 
usual construction of this part of the frame.” Pp. 206, 207. 
These extracts will fully shew our author’s pretensions to notice. 
The two remaining chapters — one on “ Shoeing,” the other devoted 
to the “ Diseases, Operations, Medicines, and Medical Treatment, 
arranged alphabetically,” — we could wish had formed no part of 
a work really possessing, in other respects, no ordinary merit/ 
The little that can be said in seventeen pages of 8vo on such an 
all-engrossing subject as “ shoeing,” and the comparatively less 
space still allowed for treating the several headings and sub-head- 
ings comprised under Diseases and Operations, and Medicines 
and Medical Treatment , makes us unwilling to touch on these two 
last chapters ; and we can only repeat our earnest wish that the 
author himself had never done so. We will, however, in justice 
to him, insert here his apology for so doing, and with that close 
our notice of his otherwise interesting work ; after again express- 
ing our assurance that all our professional and horse-loving friends 
will, as we have done, experience unfeigned gratification from the 
perusal of it. 
“ In the last portion of subject the author has been led to offer 
a precis of Veterinary Practice; not in order to induce, or enable, 
the horse-owner to attempt the medical treatment of his own 
animals, and so dispense with the services of the veterinarian, for 
such an object would-be nugatory, as well as pernicious to his best 
interests, unless, at the same time, it were possible to establish in 
his mind the elements and principles that direct the healing art. 
The horsekeeper has no greater enemy, and the veterinary surgeon 
no better friend, than the unskilled dabbler in physic. From it, 
however, he may gleam a knowledge of the causation of disease, 
and so be armed for its prevention. He will learn that it is easier 
to prevent than cure ; more to his own advantage to ward off the 
attacks of disease, than to undertake its treatment. 
“ The young practitioner may also collect, from the pathological 
and therapeutical axioms, hints which his own preliminary scien- 
tific education will teach him how to apply. Something may be 
gained by recapitulation; and new combinations, even of old 
thoughts, are frequently suggestive of considerable improvement.” 
Preface, pp. v, vi. 
