CORRESPONDENCE. 
475 
for Gen. Miles is now, and always has been, the greatest advo¬ 
cate of advancing the Army Veterinary Service, as are all other 
ranking officers of note. 
Some other cruel critics libelously charge the personnel of 
the veterinary service as being inefficient, and the cause of the 
immense annual death and condemnation list. Had those 
gentlemen been but just and critical in the proper sense, by in¬ 
vestigating into the root of this unnecessary loss, it would save 
me the painful duty of submitting a few of the salient causes of 
this waste, for except in the treatment of sick and disabled 
horses, the army veterinarians are seldom consulted on the sub¬ 
jects pertaining to their profession. 
Remounts for cavalry and other public animals are supplied 
by the Quartermaster’s Department and purchased by an officer 
of that department, without any veterinary technical training, 
assisted by some civilian expert, employed by him, who usually 
knows about as much and cares less, as he is not responsible, 
and his job is but a transitory one at best. 
Many of the remounts have come from the hands of the 
“ City Sale Stable Artist,” fixed up to deceive the quartermaster 
amateur expert, clipped and shod with polished hoofs, to cover 
defects of perpetual pavement “ pounding.” Others are ‘‘ toppy ” 
from the use of the “ overdraw ” in buggy use, and probably 
forced on the market by the bicycle, but in conformation not 
sinted for active cavalry service. A number come to us in¬ 
curably unsound and many rapidly approaching that condition. 
At all the military stations scattered over our broad continent, 
forage is inspected and received by young officers acting as 
quartermaster (frequently of the infantry branch), who have 
little, if ^ any, knowledge of its nutrition or quality. Chronic 
asthma is consequently developed through its indigestibility 
and mustiness. This is another cause for a large annual con¬ 
demnation list, for which the army veterinarian is not respon¬ 
sible. A colleague informs me that at a post at which he was 
stationed the infantry quartermaster would not receive anything 
but swamp or “ slough grass ” as hay, for it was “ green and 
good looking,” while good upland was rejected. At the same 
post, a good-natured but too confiding infantry quartermaster 
received from a smart contractor, through his irresponsible 
subordinate, a year’s supply of hay of so inferior a quality that 
the veterinarian had to emphatically protest against its further 
' use by reason of diabetes and asthma it produced. 
I am glad, gentlemen, that those conditions do not generally 
