The Illustrated Horse Management

CHAPTER I.. The Body of the Horse Anatomically Considered.

THE BODY OF THE HORSE ANATOMICALLY CONSIDERED.

Were the equine race extinct, nevertheless an anatomist, by studying its bones, might affirm its instincts and assert its uses. Every part declares it to be a creature of speed; while its large cranium and beautifully-arranged teeth would announce it to have once been connected with civilization by its intelligence, by its uses, and its herbivorous habit. The provision made for the united strength and elasticity of the spine would indicate the care nature had bestowed upon the comfort of a rider; while the mode in which the members were joined to the body, with the reach of limb peculiar to the skeleton, would equally announce that grace and that ease which had characterized the lost animal’s movements.

What lamentation would be poured forth over the absence of such a treasure! How would poignant regrets be awakened, as science demonstrated what once were the endowments of an extinct inhabitant of earth! Yet, at the present time, humanity possesses this priceless creature to lighten toil and heighten pleasure. But, how few of mankind have ever reflected upon the marvelous delicacy of the slave’s construction! It is lashed unto exhaustion and worked into deformity. Because of the treatment it experiences at the hands of the master, whom it serves, it generally ceases to exist before its body is matured; but short as its life may be, existence is to it only one continued misery!

Even mortal instruments, things of the world’s manufacture, are limited in their applications, and capable of being deranged. A spring carriage is, obviously, not a suitable conveyance for a load of paving stones. He would be esteemed mad, who should appropriate such a vehicle to so gross a purpose. The horse’s body is more delicately arranged and more nicely balanced than the perfection of human skill can hope to imitate; nevertheless, people expose themselves to no rebuke when they wrench, cripple, or destroy the beauty which is intrusted to their authority.

Yet, the thing constructed by human hands, if injured, can be repaired, and may be thus rendered again equal to its uses. A living animal, however, being damaged, is not, on this earth, to be restored to its integrity. That has been, and is lost! Mortal science may relieve the wound, but the scar remains, to conjure up thoughts of that deeper seated derangement, which is beyond the reach of this world’s medicine. The body may partially recover and the life may be prolonged; but deformity, accompanied by a proportionate loss of function, will testify to the folly that deteriorated the perfection which was given as a helpmate.

Those forms of agony, which a few years ago were more common in England than such are even at the present time, evidently declared that the horse was altogether unequal to increasing wants and growing desires of mankind. Neither the fleetness of the courser nor the strength of the heavier breed embodied the requirements of the age. Something faster and more powerful had become a public necessity; therefore railroads were permitted.

Such persons as can talk of railroads being destined to destroy the breed of horses, must suffer under a confusion of ideas. The breed of horses may be endangered, as this is being written; but the source of peril lies very far removed from the lines of tramway. The objects, capable of being fulfilled by breathing flesh and by steaming iron, are altogether separate and distinct. No living body can aspire to contend, in strength or in speed, with the results of mechanical contrivance. Neither can the forge or the furnace ever hope to produce any combination of springs and wheels which can compare with the ease of motion, the docility of temper, or the intelligence of spirit that should recommend the quadruped to the kindness of its earthly proprietor.

The horse is the associate of man. It is true, the poor animal can be goaded to excessive labor; but the creature becomes degraded when it toils beyond the sphere of mortal sympathy. No living animal should be subjected to the exactions of avarice. Life was not made to be thus debased. What, however, the horse, when properly treated, is capable of performing, remains to be hereafter demonstrated. How much it can enact, and how greatly it can benefit, when justly treated, the present customs refuse the willing drudge a chance of proving. No steed is now permitted to grow till its thews and muscles are matured. Before the season of its utility can come round, the colt is seized upon by the impatience of gain, and the baby limbs are distorted by that early affliction which forbids the natural powers to be developed.

We can, however, even by the inspection of the body, discover that it is admirably adapted for continuous and prolonged exertion. The maintenance of animal motion chiefly depends on the provision made for aerating the blood. In proportion as the vital current can be revivified or oxygenated is health promoted by those efforts, which in most bodies would, assuredly, induce congestion and death. Age becomes very important when the subject is thus considered. Respiration is in youth quicker than during adultism, because there is so much more oxygen needed when the frame is in a growing state. By working the horse before maturity is attained, the animal is obliged to labor when the ordinary velocity of the respiration permits of the less marginal speed for the breathing apparatus to exert upon extraordinary occasions. Nevertheless, that the reader may judge correctly of the care nature had bestowed upon the formation of a creature destined for subserviency to man, the following engraving is appended.

The accompanying illustration exhibits the lungs as of large proportional dimensions; while the stomach will be recognized as of more than an equally diminished capacity. Everybody must have experienced how greatly respiration is impeded by a loaded digestion; and the Common Benefactor, when creating an animal destined to display speed, seems to have anticipated the probability of such a contingency. The intestines, however, are comparatively of large extent. Into these receptacles the horse’s food passes, after having perfected the first process of digestion, and there it is subsequently mixed with the fluid secretion of the bowels, whereby the nutritive matter is separated and rendered fit for absorption.

1. The lungs. 2. The stomach. 3. The colon. 4. The diaphragm. 5. The situation of the bladder. ]

The smallness of the horse’s stomach is in itself sufficient evidence that the quadruped was designed to be a frequent feeder. It was not intended to endure prolonged abstinence; for almost in every region which the animal may canter over, its legitimate food abounds. Man, however, frequently starves the creature, that a loaded stomach may not interfere with the activity of the respiration; he, in his ignorance and in his presumption, not being willing to trust to such provision as the All-wise had made, anticipatory of this accident. At other times, the quadruped is suffered to over-gorge, its keeper paying no regard to its requirements. After an excessive fast, a quantity of cut food is placed in the manger, and the ravenous horse eats, and eats, till its small stomach, being unequal to the reception of much bolted provender, cracks its walls from excessive repletion. Such a circumstance does not demonstrate that nature was wrong, or that the equine races were formed unequal to their purposes; but it satisfactorily establishes that man cannot, with impunity, cross the designs or run counter to the institutions of Omnipotence.

The horse was created to live off the grass of the field. This habit necessitated that much ground should be traveled before the appetite of so large a body could be appeased; and the distance was the greater as the animal was sent upon the earth a nice feeder--biting oft the juicy tops of the herbage, not tearing up roots and all, like the less scrupulous bovine tribe. The time was also lengthened, by the equine race not being gifted with a power to ruminate. The ox, having filled the mouth, bestows little care upon the comminution of the food; but the jaw being moved twice or thrice, thereby crushing the herbage, so as to form it into a pellet, the mouthful is forwarded at once to the rumen. This receptacle is large, and is somewhat hastily filled. Then the ox retires to a quiet spot and there enjoys its meal; the grass being regurgitated and fully masticated, during which time the animal is said to be “chewing the cud.” The horse has no such power. The food it gathers must be prepared by mastication and insalivation before it enters the stomach; consequently, because of the niceness of its appetite, and the absolute necessity for each mouthful being separately comminuted, the horse, in a free state, has to journey far and to feed long before it can lie down and rest.

The equine race were meant to collect their sustenance from the surface of the earth; and, doubtless, the tribe are most at ease when feeding with the head lowered to the necessary position. A dog naturally lowers the mouth when it laps a fluid; but, if this creature be tempted to drink from a saucer held on a level with the ordinary elevation of the head, repeated coughing will interrupt the draught and testify to the inconvenience experienced by the animal. So, in the instance of the horse, we may infer the meal is most relished when the head sinks to its gratification; and, to justify such an inference, anatomy discloses a special provision made to that end. Such a proof is, to the author’s mind, of much more weight than any assertion to the contrary of the united British public, as emphasized by the fixed altitude of all the mangers throughout the three kingdoms.

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