362 
WARRANTY AND SOUNDNESS. 
The mares were visited by the carter at nine o’clock, pre- 
vious to his going to bed, when there was nothing to attract 
his particular attention. When he looked in upon them early 
next morning, he found that the mare which had been ex- 
pected to foal was dead, and that the other had cast her foal. 
The first-named one had evidently been dead some hours, 
and, on a closer inspection, her bowels were found hanging 
about her feet, bruised and lacerated by her treading upon 
them, but there was no appearance of a foal. On opening 
her, it was found that the foal, which was full-grown and 
healthy in appearance, but dead, lay with its head bent down 
upon the chest, and the fore-legs turned back under the body, 
in such a manner as to render delivery apparently impossible. 
The foal had, in fact, never moved into the passage, or made 
the slightest progress towards birth. In the violent efforts 
made by nature to expel the foetus, it seems that the mare 
must have forced out her bowels; and, what is more extra- 
ordinary, not by the rectum, but through a wide rupture 
which opened up a communication between the two passages. 
The other mare cast her foal prematurely, probably from 
sympathy with the terrible agony which the suffering one 
must have endured and expressed. The whole circumstance 
seems so extraordinary, that I think it is probably without a 
precedent, and one that ought to be known beyond the limits 
of a small country village. 
I trust that no apology is necessary for the communication 
of this case to a gentleman holding so prominent a position 
as a veterinary surgeon, and so extensively connected with 
horses and their owners, as yourself. 
(Signed) M. Harrison. 
W. Field, Esq. 
THE CONTINENTAL LAWS RELATING TO 
WARRANTY AND SOUNDNESS. 
By W. Ernes, M.R.C.V.S., London. 
As much controversy has of late been carried on in your 
pages on the subject of the soundness of horses, it will per- 
haps not be unacceptable to your readers to be put in pos- 
session of a brief description of the law on this important 
matter on the other side of the Channel. The oldest law in 
France on redhibition seems to have been the Code Rural. 
