Shenandoah herald. [volume] (Woodstock, Va.) 1865-1974, 1895-10-25

apostle for the brute creation, for the
mercy he demanded and achieved for
this king Of beasts. A man who owned
1000 horses, and some say 40, coo, wrote
in the Bible, "A righteous man regard
eth the life of his beast. Sir Henry
Lawrence's care Of the horse was beau
tifully Christian. He says: Il expect
we shall lose Conrad, though l have
taken so much care of him that he may
come in cool. l always walk him the
last four or five miles, and as l walk
myself the first hour, it is only in the
middle of the journey we get over the
ground" " The Ettrick Shepherd in his
matchless "Ambrosial Nights" speaks Of
the maltreatment Of the horse as a prac-
tical blasphemy. l do not believe in the
transmigration Of souls, but l cannot
very severely denounce the idea, for
when l see men who cut and bruise and
whack and welt and strike and maui
and outrage and insult the horse, that
beautiful servant Of the human race,
who carries sur burdens and pulls our
plows and turns our thrashers and our
mills and runs for our doctOrs-when |
see men thus beating and abusing and
outraging that creature, it seems to me
that it would be only fair that the doc
trine of transmigration Of souls should
prove true, and that for their punish
ment they should pass over into some
poor miserable brute and be beaten and
whacked and cruelty treated and frozen
and heated and Overdriyen-into an ey-
erlasting stage horse, an eternal traveller
on a towpath, or tied to an eternal post,
in an eternal winter, smitten with eter-
nal epizootics
Oh, is it not shame that the brute
creation, which had the first possession
Of our world, should be so maltreated
by the race that came in last-the fowl
and the fish created on the fifth day,
the horse and the cattle created on the
morning Of the sixth day and the hu-
man race not created until the evening
of the sixth day? 1t ought to be that if
any man overdrives a horse, or feeds
him when he is hot, or recklessly drives
a nail into the quick Of his hoof, or
rowels him to see him prance, or so
shoes him that his fetlocks drop blood,
or puts a collar on a raw neck, or un-
necessarily clutches his tongue with q
twisted bit, or cuts off his hair until he
has no defense against the cold, or un
mercifully abbreviates the natural de-
fense against insectile annoyance-tbat
such a man as that himself ought to be
made to pull and let his horse ridel
Kindness TO Brutes.
But not only do our humanity and
our Christian principle and the dictates
of God demand that we kindly treat
the brute creation, and especially tho
horse, but l go further and say that
whatever can be done for the develop
ment Of his feetness, and his strength,
and his majesty ought to be done. We
need to study hA atomy and his adap
tations. I am glad that large books
have been written to show how be can
be best managed, and how his ailments
can be cured, and what his usefulness
is, and what his capacities are. II
would be a shame if in this age Of the
world, when the florist has turned th
thin flower Of the wood into a gorgeous
rose, and the pomologist has changed
the acrid and gnarled fruit Of the an
clients into the very poetry Of pear and
peach and plum and grape and apple,
and the snarling cur Of the orient has
become the great mastiff, and the mis-
cradle creature Of the olden times barn
yard has become the Devonshire, and
the Alderney, and the Shorthorn, that
the horse, grander than them all, should
get no advantage from our science, or
cur civilization, or our Christianity
Groomed to the last point Of soft bril-
lance, his flowing mane a billow OF
beauty, his arched neck in utmost
rhythm Of curve, let him be harnessed
in graceful trappings and then driven
to the furthest goal Of excellence, and
then fed at luxurisnt oatbins and blank
eted in comfortable stall. The long tried
and faithful servant Of the human race
deserves all kindness, all care, all re-
ward, all succulent forage and soft lit
ter and paradisaical pasture field. Those
farms in Kentucky and in different
parts Of the north, where the horse is
trained to perfection in feetness and in
beauty and in majesty, are well set
apart. There is no more virtue in driv-
ing slow than in driving fast any more
than a freight train going 10 miles the
hour is better than an express train go
ing 80.
There is a delusion abroad in the |
world that a thing must be necessarily |
good and Christian if it is slow and |
dull and plodding There are very few |
good people who seem to imagine it is
humbly pious to drive spawned, gall
ed, glandered, spring halted, blind stag
gered jade. There is not so much virtue
in a Rosinante as In Bucephalus. We |
want swifter horses, and swifter men,
and swifter enterprises, and the church |
IF God needs to get off its jog trot.
Quick tempests, quick lightnings, quick
streams; why not quick horses7 In the |
time Of war the cavalry service does the
most execution, and as the battles Of
The world are probably not all past, our
Christian patriotism demands that we
be interested in equinal velocity. We
might as we'll have poorer guns in our
lrsenals and clumsier ships in our navy
yards than other nations as to have
lnder our cavalry saddles and before
our parks Of artillery slower horses.
From the battle Of Granicus, where the
Persian horses drove the Macedonian
infantry into the river. clear down to
The horses on which Philip Sheridan
md Stonewall Jackson rode into the
ray, this arm Of the military service
las been recognized Hamilcar, Hanni-
bal. Gustavus Adolphus. Marshal Ney
we're csyalrymen. In this arm Of the
iervice Charles Msrtel at the battle OF
Poitiers beat back the Arab invasion.
The Carthaginian cavalry, with the loss
# only 700 men. overthrow the Roman
,rmy with the loss Of 10000. In the
Iame way the Spanish chivalry drove
pack the Moorish hordeS The best way