wound is severe, this or any stimulant will increase the inflammation to a mischievous extent. The horn (if the wound is in the foot) should be pared away, and the place poulticed. Lameness occurring soon after shoeing should always excite a sus→ picion that the sensible sole has been pricked, and in such a case it is obviously impolitic to consult the smith by whom the horse was shod. In applying a poultice, it is a common practice to tie it tightly round the foot or leg with strings. This is injurious: a worsted stocking is a very convenient bag, and may easily be kept on by applying another stocking to the other foot, and passing a roller over the withers to connect the two. Any tight ligature round the leg, is injudicious if it can be avoided.

Where any place is galled or swelled by the saddle, or the harness, fomentation is the best of all remedies; should any abscess be formed it should be opened and kept open by a seton, till the matter is entirely discharged. A kick or a bruise should receive the same treatment if the contusion is considerable; and especially in the case of broken knees. In this case a horse is often more blemished by the treatment than by the accident itself. If the joint is much injured, a cure is generally hopeless; it would be more humane as

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well as more prudent to destroy the animal at once; but if the wound does not affect the joint, (and on this point the farrier alone can give certain information) it should be carefully and tenderly washed out with a sponge and warm water, and then poulticed for two or three days; after this the inflammation will probably have subsided, and ointment should be applied; not gunpowder and grease: every country blockhead recommends this to promote the growth of the hair; it has no such effect, and on the contrary it often irritates and retards the cure of the wound. Lard alone, or with a little mixture of alum, will be much better; care, however, should be taken to apply the ointment in the direction of the hair; otherwise, when the cure is effected, the hair will grow in an uneven or inverted form, and will make the blemish more apparent.

In all cases of strains, local bleeding and rest are indispensable; where the back sinews are affected, rest can only be secured by a highheeled shoe after all inflammation has disappeared, absolute rest, even for a considerable time, is requisite to a cure: if the part is enlarged, stimulating lotions, such as hartshorn and oil in equal proportions, and even blistering, may be beneficially applied; I have not, however, much faith

in any remedy but absolute rest; and even after months of quiet, I have great doubts whether severe strains, accompanied, as they often are, by a fracture of some ligament, admit of a permanent cure. In the early stages, an emollient poultice of linseed and bran should be applied to strains of the leg, whatever part of it may be injured, and the horse's diet should be changed. If by this treatment the horse apparently recovers the use of the limb without pain, the high-heeled shoe may be removed, but he should not be put to work for some weeks; he should be turned into a loose box, or a straw yard, and indeed this should be done in every serious case of local injury or internal disease.

These general hints may assist a man in directing, or at least superintending, the care of a sick horse in doubtful hands; but I only offer them as deserving attention in this extreme case, for, varying the proverb a little, when a man is his own farrier, his horse has a fool for his master.

I HAVE only casually adverted to the tricks and vices of horses. They are so frequently occasioned by the tricks and vices of the owner or his groom, that a chapter on humanity and good sense would be most appropriate to the subject. It may be taken as a sound principle that vice may be easily prevented, but rarely can be cured. Rearing, plunging, kicking in the stall, bolting, biting, and all the black catalogue of equestrian vexation, are tricks never forgotten when once acquired. A bold and clever rider will often subdue a restive horse into temporary docility; indeed, when once the mastery of a horse is effectually attained, he will be very cautious of entering into any personal discussion, but he will make up for his self-command the instant a new rider is on his back. The mill or the stage is the only place for such an animal.

I have occasionally met with young gentlemen, (very young,) who affect to prefer "a brute with a queer temper," because he will "do most work." These pinafore riders "never find the horse too much for them,"-"He goes very quietly with me!" a peculiar emphasis being carelessly as it were lent to the pronoun, apparently less by way of marking the skill of the rider, than the oddity of the horse. When I hear this, I set it down, as of course, that the speaker has never been on horseback a second time in his life, or at all events, never mounted a second horse. It is digressing a little from the subject, but I cannot resist the temptation of mentioning an adventure I had a few years since with a jackanapes of this description. He overtook me one afternoon riding home from the city; he was mounted on a good mare, but with vice legibly written on her face. He was obviously uncomfortable, and I advised him to dismount. "O no! never liked a horse better; she is rather queer, to be sure, but I am riding her into order for a friend who finds her too much for him." I was not his nurse, so I said no more. Presently he dropped his stick; I offered to hold the mare while he recovered it, but I found that he dared not dismount; he could not be assured of reseating himself! I foresaw the catas