CURSORY REMARKS. 
421 
of physic he would not, perhaps, cough six times in a fortnight, 
except after his water, which appeared to have become, what is 
called, a trick. Of course, his diet in the stable was attended to, 
and in the fifteen years I had him I do not think he was fifteen 
days at grass, which I have reason to believe would have been 
fatal to him as regarded his wind, he being a very hard feeder, 
I shot him at twenty-two, a model of condition, but lame with 
one foot, which was rather suddenly stricken with disease — the 
navicular of course ; but in those days we might as well have 
talked of the “ spi/iication This horse was never out of work 
since he went into training at Newmarket, at three-year old, and 
I think took as many purging and alterative balls as he had 
hairs on his mane and tail, but he was very rarelv bled. Nothing, 
however, but “ keeping him clean inside/’ as the grooms say, 
with attention to his diet, saved him from being broken-winded 
many years before he came to his end. 1 should observe, there 
was no unusual symptom of flatulence in this case. 
One more word about this horse. During the time I had 
him, he never ate a feed of corn without either staling, or 
attempting to stale, as soon as it was put into his manger. 
I endeavoured to break him of the trick ; but if he was stopped 
in his first effort, he would try a second, and so on till he accom- 
* The following anecdote may ainuse some of the juniors of your profes- 
sion, and they may rely on the truth of it : — The late Sir Watkin Wil- 
liams Wynn, kept, in his establishment at Wynnstay, a farrier of the old 
school, a mass of ignorance ; but so little aware of that fact, as to have pub- 
lished a book on his art, for which the celebrated caricaturist, Mr. Henry 
Bunbury, furnished a frontispiece — and a capital one it was — with these 
lines under it : — 
“ Kind Sir, if you should lame your tit. 
Peruse what’s in these pages writ. 
The blockhead smith will plainly see 
Your horse is lame above the knee ; 
Whereas these pages plainly shew 
’Tis ten to one he’s lame below.” 
Among the wits of the day, in the habit of visiting Wynnstay at a certain 
period of the year, was the celebrated David Garrick, whom his brother wits 
passed off to this said farrier, on his first arrival, as the only veterinary sur- 
geon in London. “ Be sure,” said Sir Watkin to him (the farrier), “ to 
have your sick stables in great order to-morrow, for they will be inspected 
by Mr. Garrick.” The following was the result of his visit : — “ Bless me!” 
■exclaimed Garrick, on entering the box of the third horse shewn to him ; 
“ a clearly defined case of spiflication ! /” “ I have been long suspecting 
that it would end in that, your honour,” replied William Griffiths, for such 
was the name of this excellent servant, who passed his whole life in the ser- 
vices of the late Earl of Grosvenor and Sir Watkin. 
vol. x. 3 i 
