The Mount Holly news. [volume] (Mount Holly, Burlington Co., N.J.) 1891-1942, 1911-02-28
Howl
HOW TO BUY A HORSE.

EEAStiCdt THUS on 0SleSItn9 Animal
That Will Be Useful.
The first things always to consider
In horse are his feet and legs, for it
is clear that even if he were abso-
lutely perfect In other respects he
would be of little value If anything
were the matter with his feet or legs,
says David Buffum in the Saturday
Evening Post. His feet should be SYM
metrical in shape and neither too deep
nor too fat, for the too deep foot is
more liable to become contracted, and
the fiat foot always gives trouble on
hard roads. OF these two defects,
however, the fat foot is the worse.
The limbs should be clean-that is,
free from fieshiness-and they should
have plenty Of bone and substance.
The fore legs should be long from the
horses body down to the knee and
short from the knee to the fetlock
joint. 1t is well to remember that
this point is an exceedingly important
one In road horse
The hind legs should be both clean
and fat. A round leg is always to be
4NO1OCQt anu II CdIuOl UG lOO Clcdu.
If 1t looks as if the skin had been re-
moved. the bone scraped and the skin
then put back again, so much the
better, but limbs as clean as this are
found only on high bred horses and
are not to be expected in cold blooded
or draft stock.
Much hair on the limb is also to be
ouo4dnd to,
good draft horses that are rather hairy
limbed, but the feature adds nothing
to their value and In a road horse
would be intolerable. The gambrel
joint should be strong and well devel-
oped, and it is better that it be rel
atively near the ground, though this
is not as important as in the case of
the fore knee.
Unsoundnesses of the limbs, such as
spavins, ringbones and the like are not
much to be feared in buying new"
horses, but should always be looked
for. They are very easily described,
but it would be well to study them
further by examining some horse that
is known to have them. A spawn is
the gambrel joint.
A ringbone-worst of all defects of
this character, though all are bad
enough-is a bony enlargement rum
ming around the ankle between the
hoof and the fetlock joint. Splints are
small bony engagements on the inside
Of the fore leg between the knee and
the fetlock joint They rarely do much
harm unless unduly large or situated
too near the knee. The horse should
stand squarely upon his legs. His feet
should be well under him. not sprawl
ed apart, and his hoofs should be
straight fore and aft, neither toeing
in nor out
We now come to the body. The back
should be short. The hind quarters
should be well developed, with the hip
joints fairly well forward The hind
quarters are most elegant when the
line from the top of the hips to the
root of the tail is only moderately
obliQue-neither too straight nor too
dropping. The straightness or obliq-
uity of this line does not seem to af-
feet the horses usefulness very much,
but the degree l have mentioned is
one Of the points of equine perfection
and as such should receive considera-
tion whenever possible.
The body should. be nicely rounded
and well ribbed up'-that is. the
space between the ribs and the hip
bone should be short. Horses that are
deficient in this respect are hard keep
ers and, as a rule. less satisfactory
generally than those that are more
compactly put together. The shout
ders should be slanting. This con-
formation makes a shoulder that is
both strong and elegant An upright
shoulder is a bad thing and always to
be avoided. The chest should be deep,
so as to give ample lung capacity.
The neck, so far as its utility goes,
may be either short or long, but the
latter Is more elegant. 1t should not
be fieshy nor '.beefy." and at a point
a little aft Of where IT joins the head
it should be bent little. This con-
formation leaves the windpipe curved
instead Of bent at an angle and SO
gives the breathing apparatus freer
play.
The head on high bred horses is
rather small and very clean and bony;
the cleaner the head the better on
horses of all kinds. In shape, when
viewed from the front, it should slant
in little from the eyes to the top;
when viewed from the side the face
line should be straight, not aquiline.
The eyes should be medium In size,
not too near the top Of the head, and
set well apart from each other. The
ears should be fine, pointed and of
medium length. When pointing for
ward they should be parallel, not
slanting apart