Jonas Webb, I called his attention to them. He said he had never seen such before; he had observed a horse taking into the show-yard an immense load of provender for the cattle, that astonished him beyond measure; he had resolved to try to buy him, but he lost sight of him that day, and never saw him afterwards. I thought them so superior to ours, that I resolved to buy one to take home. Very much to my disappointment, I could not find one young enough and good enough to buy. I saw them every day at their work, but none for sale. I went through all the dealers' stables without succeeding. I furnished myself with all the information to be obtained as to fairs on my way home; to some of which I went, and found, just as at our common small horse fairs, rot a good horse in them. I happened to stay a day at Rouen, when the pavement of the bridge was up, over which great loads of goods had to be drawn to the quay; there again I saw these horses coming with their great loads of goods, which they could not draw through the mud more than a few yards at once, drag themselves almost to the ground, and I never saw one refuse to draw again and again. This confirmed by resolution to have one of them; so I made an arrangement with a principal dealer in Paris, and in 1856 bought the horse I call "Napoleon," which Mr. Dennison has asked about. I have never once regretted the purchase. He has been worked on my farm ever since, almost always with mares. I have never had so good, quiet, active, and powerful a horse before. In no instance has he given us any trouble. He is unlike our English cart horse, for with great (16 hands high,) and immense substance, he shows a dash of blood. He has an Arabian head, not small, but of fine character, well proportioned to his size. The neck is very muscular, and well turned, the shoulders large, very deep, without lumps on the sides, and oblique, such in shape as would not be objected to for a riding horse; the bosom open, the fore legs magnificent, and very short, with great bone, hard sinews, and with little hair upon them. His feet are perfect in shape, and perfectly sound in work; his back short rather dipped, round-shaped ribs, large loins, rather plain drooping hindquarters, very large thighs, low down, and tightly joined together, with prodigiously powerful clean hocks, and very short hind legs, well under him. We never have had a difficulty with the engine or thrasher, or with anything in the mud that Nap. could not extricate us from. His stock are as good and kind as possible. It is a saying with the men that Nap's. colts need no breaking. My mares are small and active; the stock are considerably larger than the dams, but so cleanly that as foals they look more like carriage horses. I think the cart mares, to work and breed, should be of moderate size, from 15 to 16 hands. They should be long, low, wide, and handsome, compactly made, with short back, arching down

wards, and with wide table shaped loin. The legs should be short and clean, the bone large, especially behind. They should be good walkers, and as I recommend working the mares on the farm, the high stepping action must not be overlooked. The mares should not be put to the horse to produce foals before the grass comes on in May, when the work of the farm is very much abated, the mares can be spared for a short time, the grass will be convenient for the milk, and the weather warm for the foals. These will do well with the mares at grass (after being kept in a few nights,) till the autumn. I work my mares moderately up to the day of foaling, and I think it assists the operation; but they should not be put to snatching, distressing work. When the foals are weaned in the autumn, they must have shelter and be well kept. A few oats, cut roots, cut hay, and a little bran, will do well for them till they go to grass again in the following summer, during which time the colts must be castrated. In the winter they may again be kept in sheds. They should never be allowed to get poor. They will be useful at three years old, and do half the work of horses if kept in a cool, well ventilated stable. I have just read some observations made by Mr. Ruck, in the course of his recent lecture upon steam cultivation, delivered before the Royal Agricultural Society. He describes the inconvenience he has suffered from the illness of his farm horses, which appears to me excessive when I compare it with my own experience. I will therefore detail with some minuteness how I think such misfortunes may be avoided by gentlemen equally unfortunate with Mr. Ruck, who are compelled to employ horses in consequence of their farms being too small to allow of the use of Mr. Fowler's steam-tackle. With the aid of three illustrations, I will describe the stable in which the cart horse can live healthily, consume his food without waste, while the liquid manure is economized for the highest fertilizing purpose. The stable should not be less than eighteen feet wide, and of such a length as will allow a six feet standing for each horse. It should be ten feet high. The horses stand in a single row, and the harness is hung on pegs in the wall behind them. This width admits of thorough ventilation to the stable, without subjecting the horses to draughts. Each standing should be parted off by an upright post reaching from the ground to the ceiling rafter, placed three feet off from the wall at the horses head. These partitions should be closely boarded up three feet above the manger and hay crib, to prevent the horses quarreling about the food, and kicking each other. To each of these posts a bale, eight feet long and one foot eight inches wide, should be hung by a strong chain, to divide the standings, and suspended by another strong chain at the hinder end from the ceiling rafter. Each chain should have a hook and eye within reach, that may be readily unfast

ened. This arrangement will leave a space of six feet opposite the head of each horse, available for feeding purposes. The manger for corn and chaff may be made two feet six inches long. It should be two feet wide at the top, one foot two inches at the bottom. The hay and straw, which should be cut into six inch lengths, will require a larger receptacle, which should be three feet six inches long, two feet wide at its upper part, and half that width below. It should be so constructed that while even with the manger above, it should reach to the ground, two feet above, which should be fixed to the wall a bottom, sloping to one foot above the ground in the front, where some upright opening should be cut, so as to admit of the escape of the seeds and dirt. At the top of this hay and straw crib an iron rack, with bars six inches apart, should be so hung as to open up and fall back against the wall to let the fodder be put in, and then be put down upon it for the horse to eat through. It should be so much smaller than the opening that it can fall with the fodder as it is consumed, by which means not a particle is wasted. The manger may be constructed of yellow deal, one and a half inches thick for the front, back, and ends; the bottom of slate, three-fourths of an inch thick. The top of the front and ends should be covered with half round iron, two and one-half inches wide, screwed on to project over the front outside a quarter of an inch, and three-quarters of an inch inside the manger. This prevents the food from being tossed out, and the manger being gnawed. A short post must be put up as near the centre of the standing as possible to support the manger, into which a large screw ring must be put to let the chain or rope of the headstall pass freely up aud down without constant friction. The manger may be three feet six inches from the ground to the top; the hay crib of course the same height. The paving of the standings three feet six inches from the head, should be flat, then with a fall from both sides to the centre, where an angle iron drain of four inches wide from out to out, with a removable flat iron cover fitted to the inside of it, should be placed straight down the standing, with a fall into another larger cross main drain, ten feet six inches from the head, so placed as to carry away the urine from all the smaller drains into a tank outside the stable. This main drain so placed takes the urine from the mares, and has a loose cover also fitted to it, easily removed for sweeping out when necessary, perhaps once a week.

This system keeps the stable healthy, economises the urine, and the straw also the latter very important where it can be sold or consumed as food. The width of 18 feet for the stable gives room for narrow corn bins, 3 feet high, so that each carter may have his horse's corn separate. The ventilation is the most important feature in the construction of the stable, upon it depends the health of all the horses, and, consequently,

their usefulness. No stable should be without a constant change of air, and no horse in it should feel the draught. The two ends of the stable may be so contrived as to effect this object in this manner: Take 12 feet from the head wall to the opening for the stable door; allow 8 inches for the two door posts, and 4 feet 6 inches for the door. This will leave 10 inches between the door-post farthest from the horses and the back wall, This space, from the ground to the top of the door, should be left open, and covered with strong rabbit wirework, which should be permanently fixed. The door should be 7 feet high, and cut into two parts, horizontally, at a height of 4 feet. The lower part may be kept shut while the horses are in; the upper 3 feet may be open or shut, according to the state of the atmosphere. Mine are seldom shut, except the wind is blowing heavily in; we then close that end. There is another communication with the outer air between the door and the ceiling. The opening may be 3 feet long, and so placed that one end is against the back wall. It should have zinc, perforated with a quarter of an inch hole, permanently fastened over it. This arrangement will keep the stable sweet and the horses healthy. I have no communication from the stable to the loft above for any purpose, as I have learnt by observation this promotes draughts which are highly injurious to the eyes. The stable should be ceiled, for the convenience of lime-whiting. Plenty of light should be admitted from the hinder wall, by narrow fixed windows here and there, made of slabs of strong glass, never to be opened. Windows opening in bad directions, and open sky-lights kill horses by wholesale. The arrangement I have described is suited for 10 horses. Where 18 feet cannot be had, 17, or even 16 may be made to do, by taking six inches from the width of the door, and the rest from the space between the door and the head wall. It is important that the water-of which cart horses are allowed to drink about as much as they like-should be exposed to the atmosphere at least six hours before they are allowed to have it; and they should never be allowed to drink until they have eaten something. The colic (commonly called gripes) is almost always occasioned by their taking large quantities of cold water into empty stomachs. Cart horses, more particularly than any others, are subject to greasy heels and farcy legs, the treatment of which I leave to the veterinary surgeon; but my experience has taught me that in almost all cases they may be avoided, by not allowing the farmservants to wash them in the pond, nor in the stable when they return from their work. Neither of these operations would produce the disease if they were rubbed dry immediately; but as it is impossible to get this done, I have stopped the washing entirely. If the dirt cannot be rubbed off, I allow it to remain on and dry upon their legs. The adoption of this

system many years since has completely prevented the occurrence of those diseases. The temperature of the cart-horse stable should be as little above the external air as may be, to keep the inmates comfortably warm. You should never feel, nor smell, that you are in a stable. The working cart horse when turned out to grass in the summer, may have in the stable 8 or 10 pounds of bruised oats, mixed with a little hay and straw cut together into chaff; in the winter time, he will consume, entirely in the stable, of bruised oats, 10 pounds; of hay and straw, cut together, 7 pounds each; of cut roots, 28 pounds, given with the oats and chaff. This style of feeding will cost in summer about 11d. per day, for each horse, besides the grass, and 1s. 2d. per day in winter. When roots cannot be had, 1 pound of dry bran to each horse per day may be used instead. When horses work excessively, a small quantity of split beans may be given in addition, but I do not advocate this; I do not like beans for cart horses, and very seldom, indeed, give any. I have now done with the cart horse, with which, I am sure, I have severely taxed the patience of my readers, and proceed to another kind of draught horse, the like of which, I think I may safely say, there is not in Europe, if there be in any part of the world, the London carriage horse. I need hardly say how much I admire them; I feel sure everybody everywhere admires them as much as I do. It is the breeding of them of which I am to write, not of themselves. My observation and experience in breeding them induce me to think they are more surely bred, more easily sold, at an early age, with less trouble and more profit, than any other class. They may be bred, too, from mares that can do the work of the farm thoroughly well. The Cleveland bay, the Scotch gray, and the Clydesdale mare, put to the good thoroughbred horse, will all breed capital carriage horses for the London market. If the mares are well selected, and the high stepping action not overlooked, very valuable horses indeed may be thus produced. Where this is aimed at, more attention must be paid to fine heads and necks, than is necessary for cart use. Thoroughbred mares breed first rate horses, put to a good cleanly three-parts bred cart stallion. The young stock, intended to come out early, at three years old off, must not be neglected in their early keeping; if they are, force meat must be had recourse to, and then follow the strangles, distemper, roaring, lameness, &c., &c., which I need not parade before my readers, who are in some instances too well acquainted with them, without, perhaps, having ascertained the cause. Before concluding with draught horses, I must not omit to mention what appears to me an important guide in selecting horses for their different purposes. They all have either to draw or carry weight-two distinct purposes. The line of the vertabræ indicates to which of these purposes they can work with