346 
HEALTHY STABLES. 
In the annual review of the progress of hygiene presented 
to the Army Medical Department, by Professor Parkes, of 
the Army Medical School, and lately issued, notice is taken 
of the recent report on cavalry stables, made after an inquiry 
into the subject by the Barrack Improvement Commission. 
The question is entirely solved whether or not the men 
should be placed over the stables. As regards the men, 
there was much to be said against this arrangement, but 
there was something to be urged for it. But the horse's 
health has turned the scale. The stables cannot be properly 
ventilated or lighted if the men's rooms are overhead. In 
some of the cavalry stables examined, the air was so foul that 
it was matter of surprise how animals could breathe it and 
retain any measure of health. In the old troop stables at 
Hounslow each successive horse, from the corners to the 
centre, is supplied with air fouled more and more by the 
other horses. Many animals would perish under the treat¬ 
ment inevitable in the older class of cavalry stables but for 
two things—their daily exercise in the open air, and a certain 
habit which their constitutions acquire of resisting air 
poisoned by continued exposure to their action ; but this 
resisting power of habit can only be trusted to temporarily, 
and inevitably ends in loss of health and life. If the horse 
is to be in health and strength, he must have a free diffusion 
of the atmosphere, including absence of stagnation, abund¬ 
ance of light, good drainage, absence of nuisance, and suffi¬ 
cient space to live in. The inquiry has shown beyond 
question that the best form of building is a one-storied stable 
and one or two rows of horses; the ventilation to be by the roof, 
and formed by a louvre 16 in. wide, carried from end to end, 
and giving four square feet of ventilating outlet for each 
horse. The stables recommended to be built in future would 
give each horse 100 ft. of superficial, and 1605 cubic feet. A 
course of air-brick would be carried round at the eaves, giving 
one square foot of inlet to each horse; an air-brick is intro¬ 
duced, about six inches from the ground, in every two stalls; 
there is a swing window for every stall, and spaces are left 
below the doors. In this way, and by attention to surface 
drainage and roof lighting, it is anticipated that stables will 
become perfectly healthy. In old stables ventilating shafts 
are to be carried up and air-bricks introduced. More window 
space is to be given.— Times , 
