The Horse in the Furrow
Page 21
Not all of the old horsemen were models of patience and kindness: some of them—probably a small minority—used practices that were undoubtedly cruel, and would certainly be illegal today. One of the most drastic of these was their treatment of hard-mouth. If a horse had been unskilfully broken in and mishandled afterwards its mouth became hard and insensitive. Usually this was done by excessive pulling on the reins, on the assumption that a horse must be stopped by force instead of by association—a reflex action following gentle pressure of the bit in the mouth. This reflex action could be properly instilled in a colt only by adequate training or conditioning, and later intelligent handling. That is the reason the horse-gentler was so insistent on the use of light hands for a colt who was being trained to the bit. Once the hardening process had set in the damage was difficult to undo; and some horsemen resorted to the make-shift method of making the side of the mouth responsive by physical means. One practice was to rub it with the edge of a milled coin which would temporarily make the mouth tender and more susceptible to the pressure of the bit. Another method was more questionable still: before the adequate registration of poisons some horsemen used corrosive sublimate of mercury, a deadly poison, to make the side of the horse’s mouth tender. Two chemists who came into the Stowmarket district of Suffolk between thirty and forty years ago were amazed by the practice and refused to sell the chemical for this purpose.
One of the recognised forms of restraint for a horse that did not behave itself among the other horses in the yard was the clog. ‘You’d always find a master horse in a yard; and if there was a new comer, the owd master often got the new horse into a corner and let out at him. When this happened the head horseman said: “Put tha’ owd clog on har, bor,” or something like that. We made the clog in this way: we got a piece of ash; bored a hole in each end of it; and then bent it to form a loop. After we’d tied it in position with cord, we boiled it; so it would always keep that shape. This loop was placed round one of the kicker’s back legs, and a piece of iron threaded through the holes to keep it in position. A short length of chain, with a piece of wood like a policeman’s truncheon attached to the end of it, was fixed to the iron on the leg. The kicker dragged this piece of wood round the yard with him; and when he started his bad habits and let out, the clog naturally came back and gave him a sharp rap across the hocks. He soon got tired o’ thet.’
Hobbles or hopples were made on the farm in an improvised way by looping a long piece of sacking, or tough cloth, around the forelegs in the manner of a figure-of-eight and tying it securely. In the old days it was not unusual to see a team of horses hobbled on the road to prevent them from moving on. Herman Biddell gave an instance. John Julian of Boat’s Hall, Laxfield, one of the early breeders, owned several well known horses. ‘He was chiefly celebrated for driving his four stallions in a team together, and tradition draws a picture of the four standing by the alehouse door each with a fore-leg strapped up while the teamster himself stepped in to see who was in the room with the sanded floor. In 1813 he advertises the four Boxer 755, Briton 758, Bumper 759 and Bly 753, and there is, I have heard a painting (I expect by Hobart) of the quartett in a waggon, somewhere still in existence.’1 Pictures of a team of four horses in a wagon must have been very popular during this period. William Groom of Claydon has a painting of a similar subject done by a village artist: it dates from early last century and is valued as a family heirloom. The horse, Boxer, in Julian’s team was a son of Smith’s Horse of Parham and a direct descendant of Crisp’s Horse of Ufford. He must still hold the long-service record above all Suffolk stallions: he travelled for twenty-five seasons before retiring.
Another recognised implement for restraining a restless horse while he was being treated was the twitch. This was a simple device—a holed stick and a looped cord. The loop was placed round the horse’s lip, or even the ear, and twisted until it was tight, holding the horse in the same way as a ring through the nose holds a bull.
The show-horse often had special items of equipment associated with the special nature of his task—which was to look convincing and to show brisk action immediately when called upon to do so. Herman Biddell has revealed how a special bridle was made for a famous horse to correct a fault that would have lost him marks in the show ring. The horse was Manchester Boxer 298, father of Catlin’s Duke 296: ‘He was a good reddish chesnut, but his ears were so bad, so drooped, that old Row had a special bridle made to keep them up, which so altered his appearance that as soon as the new invention was put in practice he became quite a different horse to look at.’2 Another show-horse device, used in at least one stud, was a mask or hood made of leather. This was fitted on to a horse’s head while he was in the horse-lines prior to going into the show-ring. The mask completely blinded him. But when it was taken off just before he was led into the ring, his eyes were full and staring, giving him that animated look the judges like to see in competing horses. In the same stud a neck-band of padded leather, weighted underneath with lead shot, was kept tied under the jaw and over the crest of a horse that ‘was a bit thick in the glands’ in an attempt to correct this fault.
At horse-sales and horse-dealers’ stables one implement was constantly seen years ago; though it is rarely used today. This is a measuring stick for measuring a horse’s height. In appearance it is like a thick walking stick; and in fact it was used for this purpose, but in the shaft of the stick is concealed a steel rod with a short steel arm hinged to its top. The rod is taken out, thus extending the stick; and, the small arm resting horizontally on the horse’s withers, the height in hands is read off on the gradations marked on the steel rod.
There are a number of items linked with the doctoring of a horse. Most physic is administered to a horse in the form of a ball. The ball is introduced direct into the back of his throat, and he has little choice but to swallow it. Some ‘vets’ used a gagging-or balling-iron—an iron frame to keep the horse’s mouth open—while the ball was shot into the throat with the physic gun. The old type of horseman, however, rarely used this apparatus. He gave a horse the physic ball by the following method: he first held the horse’s tongue out at the side of the mouth and then, taking the ball between his first two fingers of his other hand, he deftly slipped it into the gullet. One horseman was very scathing about the use of physic guns: ‘I once see a vet use a gun and show up the real fault of it. It stands to reason if you shoot something hard against the back of a horse’s throat, it will bounce back. It’s bound to. That’s what was happening with this chap; and there were about half-a-dozen balls on the floor of the stall before he left off. Then I did it in the old way. I got a pliable hazel-twig; stuck a ball at the end of it, and with my fingers on top, bent it so it went right round the corner and into the horse’s gullet.’
A method of drenching a horse commonly used in Suffolk farms was as follows: The horseman threw a looped rope across an overhead beam in the stable. He then placed the loop in the horse’s mouth, getting someone to pull the free end of the rope. As the horse’s head was pulled up he dropped his lower jaw, and made it comparatively easy for the horseman to pour the drench down his throat. The bottle containing the drench was made of tin.
The ‘vet’ occasionally had to use a file on a young horse with a wolf’s tooth. This is a second tooth which instead of growing under the primary, middle tooth pushes its way out at the side. It cuts the horse’s cheek; makes eating difficult and therefore causes him to go thin. A horseman described how a ‘vet’ filed down a wolf ’s tooth, dipping the file now and then into a bucket of water, which he had beside him, to keep the file cool.
Under his December Husbandry Tusser wrote:
Ere Christmas be passed let horse be let blood
for many a purpose, it doth them much good.
The day of St Stephen, old fathers did use,
if that do mislike thee some other day use.
Blood-letting has fallen out of use long ago, but some of the implements connected with this practice are
occasionally discovered in out-of-the-way villages in the county. One of these is a fleam, a kind of knife for opening a horse’s vein. Allan Jobson had a specimen, along with the small hammer with which it was used, in his collection of tools at the village of Westleton.
The two verses which follow the above passage from Tusser show how baiting the horses of the farm and the proper measuring of their corn from the granary was equally important in his day:
Look well to thy horses in stable thou must
that hay be not foisty, nor chaff full of dust;
Nor stone in their provender, feather, nor clots
nor fed with green peason for breeding of bots.
Some horsekeeper lasheth out provender so,
Some Gillian spend-all, so often doth go
For hogs-meat and hens-meat, for that and for this,
that corn-loft is emptied, ere chapman hath his.
An inventory3 of the ‘Implements of howsehould and husbondry late of Arthure Coke of Bramfeild in the County of Suff. Esquyor deceased’ (made in 1629) shows how important and ubiquitous horse-gear was in those times: items of horse equipment seem to have been scattered all over the house. Among other items there were:
In the Parlor: one payer of newe Spurrs ijs od
a snaffle (bridle) ?
In the Hall: j leather Sadle for a great horse
& parte of the furniture xxvs 0
j pillion (saddle) iijs 0
In the Kytching: j pillion cloath iijs iiij
v horse locks (?) v keyes viijs 0
ij bytts with bosses vj
j payer of stirrupps viij
In Mister Cokes Chamber:
iij brydles with silver buckles ?
ij payer of spurrs… ?
& ij nitingales (martingales?) ?
In the Hall Vounce Ruff (vaunce roof or attic)
a woman’s sadle vjs 0
ould harneis for ij Coach
horses ?
In the Stable Chamber:
j Anvile vjs 0
j greate symthes (sic) vice
& j beake iron xxvjs viijd
The scale of Arthur Coke’s husbandry may be gathered from the number of horses and the amount of farm gear:
In the Stable: j stoned Flaunders horse v li 0s. 0d
j hand barrowe, j Carte roope,
ij Tubbs, j pytchforke & j brydle vjs vjd
In the Cartehouse:
j Carte, j Cartebooke, j Crud4
barrowe (wheelbarrow) and j
Tumbrell iij li xvs 0d
ij payer of Harrowes & j plough xijs
In an other Stable:
j Stoned Colt v li 0s 0d
Before passing to the next section an unorthodox use of a piece of horse-gear, a use once common in Suffolk villages, should be recorded. In the village of Blaxhall at Whitsun, a fair was regularly held in the village inn. Blaxhall Ship Inn Fair took place on Whitsun Wednesday. A club existed with its centre at the inn and the landlord was the treasurer. Members of the club saved up during the year to celebrate the Fair. (An annual outing to the seaside has long ago displaced this occasion). Some of the money saved went in prizes for the various competitions held during the day. One of the most popular of these competitions was Sneering through a Horse-collar. Sneering is the dialect for making an ugly face; and the best—or the worst?—sneerer took the prize. There was at one time a kind of folk tale relating to this game in Suffolk: A curious old lady, seeing the horse-collar hanging up in an unusual position, exclaimed peevishly: ‘What’s this for? What are they a-dewin’ with this here?’ She poked her head through the collar and was immediately awarded the prize.
Sneering through a horse-collar was a sport that was not confined to Suffolk. A bill, preserved in the Cambridge Folk Museum, records the Cambridge Coronation Festival Rustic Sports: these were held to celebrate the coronation of Queen Victoria and the date was Thursday, 28th June 1838; the place—Midsummer Green, Cambridge. One of the items in the sports was:
‘A GRINNING MATCH: or Which is the Ugliest Phiz?
This Match will be contested by men of all ages and all complexions—all description of physiognomy—and every degree of ugliness and beauty—whether short or tall, little or big, lean or fat, young or old, green or grey—and must be performed according to the normal customs on these occasions, exhibiting in Grimaldian excellence and bold relief, the various contortions of the ‘Human Face Divine’ by peeping through a Pegasian Cravat—or as the vulgar would profanely designate it—a Horse’s Collar! The party who shall be declared the winner will be rewarded with a bran new pair of Velveteen Trousers and a New Wipe. The other competitors will be rewarded with a gallon of Sam Moore’s regular right-sort, Headstrong, Out and Out, Strong bodied, Ram-Jam, Come-it-strong, Lift-me-up, Knock-me-down, How-d’ye-like-it, Genuine Midsummer Green Stingo! and a new Hat each.’
Although none of the other Blaxhall competitions is connected with horse-gear, they are included as examples of the way farm workers and their wives enjoyed a frolic. Races were a prominent part of the fair. These were held on the road outside the inn and the distances were: one mile, a half and a quarter of a mile. Trees along the road—some of the old people still remembered which particular trees—marked the starting points; and all the races finished at the inn. The prizes were packets of tea, sweets and beer—as men women and children competed. At one point of the fair it was the tradition for the landlord to go upstairs with a frying pan full of Hot Ha’pennies. He scattered these from a window onto a sandy area just in front of the inn door. The antics of the children as they scrambled and tried to pick up the coins were one of the highlights of the day. Drinking the Hottest Cup of Tea was a competition reserved for the women. All the leather-tongued gossips competed; but one woman was invariably the winner. She had a fake—a trick: just before the contest started she smeared her mouth well with butter. While the women were competing the men were Bowling for Nine-pins at the back of the inn. Then in the evening the fun continued inside the inn: drinking and Singing the Old Songs to the tune of the ‘cordion’. Folk songs—many of them connected with the sea—were the chief items. There was also Stepping or Dancing. Stepping has always been a feature of this particular village and it is still practised to a certain extent today. In the old days the boys learned to step on two bricks. A great deal of the stepping seems to have been improvised but it also contained the remnants of old dances. One of these was the Candlestick Dance: ‘You first tucked up your skirts between your legs and you danced backwards and forwards, round and about and over a lighted candlestick. The tune was Jack be Nimble, Jack be Quick played over and over again on the ‘cordion’. If you put out the candle you were finished. I learned this dance from my mother. It’s a very old dance. The men wore high-heeled boots at that time o’ day. They were lovely boots; and they danced to the ‘cordion’ usually; but if there was anything special on they had a fiddler.’
Priscilla Savage of Blaxhall gave most of the above information and she commented: ‘You had to make your own fun at that time. Nobody hardly went out of the village; and it was up to people to make their own enjoyment. Whitsun week was a jolly time. Blaxhall folk used to say: “I like Whitsun Monday (Framlingham Fete), I like Whitsun Tuesday (another local frolic); and o’ course I like Whitsun Wednesday; but damn Whitsun Thursday!”’ It was back to earth, on that day, in the fullest sense of the phrase.
1 S.H.S.B., Vol 1, p. 616.
2 S.H.S.B., Vol. 1, p. 647.
3 Proceedings of the Suffolk Institute of Archaeology, Vol. xxv (1952) p. 268. Transcript by Francis W. Steer.
4 Also crudburra: A.O.S., p. 290.
18
Horse Brasses and Other Ornaments
The common explanation for the use of the brass decorations on a horse is that they are survivals from the time when the horse was considered susceptible to the evil influences of witches. The decorations, it is claimed, were amulets or charms to render ineffective the power of the evil eye. As such they undou
btedly have a very ancient origin. These ornaments are mentioned in the Old Testament and received short shrift as superstitions.1 They were known in pre-Roman times, and in Nubia horse-trappings have been discovered with pieces that were undoubtedly amulets. The crescent, a symbol of the moon, was the most common type of charm associated with horses, and the design survives in the modern commercially manufactured horse-brasses. The horse-shoe, still in common use as a charm—nailed, points uppermost, to buildings—is said to have acquired this use through its approximation to the shape of a crescent. The crescent is an ancient symbol: it was associated with Isis, the Egyptian goddess; and also with Diana, the Roman goddess who was linked with both the moon and with horses. She was also the goddess who presided over child-birth, and Roman matrons wore a crescent ornament as a charm against evil influences. The circular form of design, a symbol of the sun, also figured in old horse-trappings and is still a common motif in modern brasses—the rayed-sun design and derived figures such as the wheel. The heart is also a frequent symbol, said to have been used by the ancient Egyptians to protect a horse’s owner.2
Yet this common desire to attribute an obscure origin and mysterious purpose to the decorations given to a horse seems to over-ride their main purpose which was certainly decoration itself, and a natural love of colour and display. Pomp and wealth have always been associated with the fine horse—the war-horse, the coach-horse, the circus-horse and the race-horse—and with these the love of display in decoration has taken various forms. That the heavy horse’s decorations became specialised in horse-brasses was probably due to the weight of these extra trappings: an authentic brass-set is very heavy and was worn only on ceremonial occasions,3 and only a heavy horse, not called upon to show much action, was suitable for wearing it. Again, the brasses’ durability would commend them to grooms and carters; for, once purchased, they did not need replacing and were, in fact, handed down from father to son as family heirlooms. Conversation with many horsemen in Suffolk has not brought out one statement about the symbolic meaning of horse-brasses; and experience here suggests that decoration was the chief, if not the only, motive for their use. The observations of two horsemen appear to sum up the general attitude: