902 
THE HORSES OF THE PRUSSIAN ARMY. 
must be ascribed to the remount department. It is scarcely 
necessary to add that the German veterinary surgeon, for 
education and intelligence, is scarcely to be equalled, and 
his position in the army entitles him to have his science 
and his services suitably and promptly recognised. This 
being the case, and knowing that he is a prominent member 
of the remount commission, we need not be surprised that the 
quality and condition of the German cavalry horses during 
the late wars, even under the most adverse circumstances, 
were the wonder and admiration of more than one English 
military correspondent, and that the losses from disease and 
preventive accidents should be almost reduced to a minimum. 
It would appear to some people that an army veterinary 
surgeon’s duty in this country is merely to cure disease and 
examine horses as to soundness ; and they are incapable of 
understanding, or are unwilling to admit, that his services 
should be utilised in preventing disease, and in taking care 
that horses are not admitted into the service whose confor¬ 
mation, besides rendering them comparatively worthless, even 
for light duty, predisposes them to serious maladies. In 
selecting remount horses, a knowledge of anatomy and phy¬ 
siology is necessary, and a special application of these to the 
study of conformation is most essential. Fancy an army 
surgeon, in examining a recruit, being ordered to certify only 
to his actual freedom from present disease, and forbidden to 
express an opinion as to the physical defects which none but 
an educated eye can detect: this being left for some chance 
amateur who knew nothing of the matter! What kind of 
army should we have in a year or two ? and how much 
would it be worth in the field ? 
These remarks have been elicited by a retrospective view 
of recent events ; by the knowledge, derived from personal 
observation, that our army is far from being so well horsed 
and prepared for war in the equine department as it should 
be; and that our present arrangements for remounting, while 
terribly expensive during war, would only provide us with 
animals which, in a very brief space, would add to a heavy 
sick list, or disappear altogether in the first few weeks of a 
campaign. But I must confess that they have been more 
especially elicited by an excellent article in Colburn's United 
Service Magazine for August last on “ Prussian Army 
Horses,” written by a gentleman who stands high as an 
authority on military subjects, and who did me the honour 
to request my aid in pointing out the desirability of establish¬ 
ing an Annual Veterinary Statistical Report of the Army, on 
the plan of the Army Medical Statistical Report , the import- 
