The Dorset County Express and Agricultural Gazette.
Dorchester, Dorset, England, 1862-11-25 00:00:00

ORIGINAL COMMUNICATIONS.

IHE HORSE, AND FACTS AND FANCIES

ABOUT 'HIM.—No. 13.

When we try a horse with an idea of buying him, if
for s hack the trial is not a vety protracted one. Ye
shades of Cyrus I what a to-do it is with the novice at
having (the most painfel person to deal with in
existence) • horses The twisting, the turning, the
trotting, the cautering, the numberless questions,
shaming °own-ion-sense to answer, and then it last the
—"I think lie won't do ; I will ask Mr. Sharp-eye's
opinion, and give you an answer ip a day or two. Very
Mulch obliged. Good morning." A thousand times
better deal with a professional horsedealer, with a charae•
ter, good, bad, or indifferent, than with such kind of
People we mention, who, if they have wits, seem to re-
quire to go back to yesterday evening to find them. If
a professional horseclealer has got hold of you, and he
shows you a hack, you affection • bit, get on his back,
and loosing his head, let him walk a couple of hundred
yards or so, on a footpath. If nature has designed him
to stick his toe into the groupd instead of putting his
foot down quite fiat, by which alone he can go safe, he
will do so two or three times before lie goes that
distance. There are small undulations iti • road of
that description Which are scarcely perceptible, and for
that reason will immediately detect this sort of action.
If, on the other hand, he will walk smoothly over it
without touching it, try his other paces, and if 'these
suit you, you need not fear his tumbling down. There is
nothing so nasty in locomotion as a spill in the hard
road ; it don't hurt hunting it opines as a matter of
coarse ; or it don't, we don't care much ; that it didn't;
but • header on the flints or in the mud, eli,Joseph It
is outrageously disagreeable, for the first moment the
feeling is indescridable ; therefor* we say too much fore-
thought cannot be given to the condition of a hack's fore
legs and hind legs too. Never trust a hack entirely to
himself, however pleasant it may feel,or nonchalant it may
look, to fling the rein on the animal's neck and appear
in • sort of day-dream. Feel his mouth lightly, and if
double-bitted more with the bradoon than with the
curb, and for the following reasons :—ln the first place.
to go safe on the road, a horse must carry his head,
I where nature intended he should carry it, and by riding
him on the bradoon he will be more disposed to go
naturally than when coerced by the sharper bit. The
I lighter bit keeps the mouth sensitive, and alive; the
other numbs it, and deadens it. However pleasant
and wholesome hone exercise is, we must remember
that no man knows when he gets upon the back of a
horse, how, he shall get off him ; and sure it is, that
when under any circumstances, we trust our safety to
another, the insurance becomes doubly hazardous.
Common precautions, therefore, are neither to be des-
pised, nor neglected. A leg, a thigh, a skull, (if it be
not over thick) is easily fractured; and therefore a
, really good hack is • most scarce and difficult honse to
meet with, but invaluable to a man who rides Much on
the road, particularly after it has become • matter of
Importance to society, or his family, that be should
take care of himself, "What is your idea of a, hack ?" we
once odd to a man, who liked to get over the road
twelve miles an hoar. "A good lively trotter" was
the answer. Now to our judgment, our feat friend took
• very mistaken view of the case. The trot, especially
if quick, is • most ungraceful pace, only fit for
a butcher's boy ; besides which, it wears out a horse
much sooner than a minter, in consequence of the weight
being all thrown upon one fore leg at the same
moment, whereas in the canter it is equally divided
between both. Fast trotting distresses a horse as much
as gallopiog—in each action he is going to the top of
his sped. A good safe walker, and pleasant at the
canter, • lady's horse, in fact, a home that will carry •
lady well, is the sort of hack for road wotk. Those
horses that glide along, coveting ground fast without
appearing to do so, going ten or eleven miles an hour
in the canter, whilst you suppose they are going eight,
consulting the ease and comfort of the rider by making
no sudden breaks In pate, nor shying at every toin-tit
that flits ont of the hedge, going iodised like oil, soft
and smooth, and digestible, such are the animals
Worthy of being called hacks ; such are the animals
dealers should endeavour to procure for customers
liberal enough to pay a good price for them. Whilst
upon this point we would again direct attention to the
shoulder and hind leg of the animal. If these are not in
their places it is in vain to look for their true action.
Good lengthy shoulders, and well bent hinder legs,
with these qualities, if he is not • brute, you may
depend on mod service. For ourselves' we believe •
, horse cannot have • good month • with straight hind
legs ; snob an animal cannot pull together—neither his
head or hie heels are where they ought to be. l'ou
may say whet, your arms are half pulled off, and your
whole sYstem disarranged, "The pulling brute;" but
remember the fault is not his, it was soma for buying
him. We will now come to some facts and fancies
about the horse, and the management of him blended
together. There are' few practical matters appertaining
to that delightful individual in his own estimation,
dear No. 1, in which Englishmen are alias a body so
quietly foolish, pig-headed, and witlese,as in the manage-
ment of the horse. Unless men are keen huntirg men
(and some of these take up most erroneous crochet.). it
is lamentable how ignorant, and how aelf-sufficient too,
(these two pet qualities, however, generally go to-
gether) they are about the way to keel) their horses in
good condition. Some think fat condition, and fatten
the animal accordingly, as he would an ox for Smith-
field; others of • nearer dlspoeition think leanness de-
sirable, and take good mire to be very. sparing of the
oats; others think corn is only necessary just before oh
after a long journey, and some fancy such mixtures to
save the pocket as will keep the poor beast in such a
state of fever end bad condition that they are in
jeopardrevery time they sit behind them, or upon the
back of them. Theory is no good in horse manage-
ment. If you really are in ignorance of what manage-
ment means, of what it really is, go to a friend who
does understand it, and sot in accordaeoe with his sug-
gestions. When we coolly expresa en opinion that in
our belief half the good in a horse goes in al his mouth,
you will understand the importance we attach to stable
management. In the first place the stable should be
roomy, thoroughly well ventilated, dry, and free from
draught; and in the,next a good groom is essential,
and your good sense ehould oopatantly impress upon his
not over lively imagination (for imaginative servants
are not commonly good for much we believe,)
that the food of the animals he has in charge should be
proportioned to work, or plethora, the root of all evils
(either in man or beast) will surely reault. Plethora is I
created by everything that makes a great quantity of
good chyle and blood, and at the same time hinders
their, attenuation, corruption, and perspiration, through '
the pores of the skin, Exercise (good work) fairly
given, is the secret of • horse's health, and if oars is
taken in the feeding, this ia what brings bins into what
we will call condition. Not only the muscles of the
body but the hind also are powerfully strengthened by ,
good work. The quickness of respiration, by repeated
galloping,produees an elasticity in these organs far above
, their ordinary powers; and as particularly with hunters
(a clam of animals we will treat on in our next letter)
I wind is strength. It is a oonidderation of the highest im-
himself, as portance 'hi: V:: over °:,:e'd",, Zit:. tar his
,1 hunter be in good wind, for without it, the beet fencer
lis powerless and even dangerous. The ill-effects of rest,
and the good effects Of work,on the powers and energies
of a horse, are astonishing. In long-continued rest his
flesh become.
(soft and flabby, and the muscles lose their
elasticityand even their substance. This is portico-
lady shown in the human subject ; for let a man forego
the use of one of his legs for twelve months, the muscles
of that leg will fall away, though they will in some
measure recover on his resuming the action of the limb.
With horses lame in the feet this is also plainly shown.
The muscles of the chest fall away because they are not
called into their proper action, which • cripple has not
the power of doing, although be may Work every day.
This gaverMe, no doubt, to the vulgar, but now nearly
exploded idea., of chest-foundered horses, whereas such
a complaint doe not exist. The evil of all this lies in
the feet. The wastingof the muscles of the cheat is the
effect, not the cause. In *iron work, when a horse is
sound, every muscle and fibre of his body are braced as
it were until they become as tough as whipcord,

(To be continued.)