Mr. Black, veterinary surgeon of the 14th Light Dragoons, informed me that sugar was tried as an article of horses' food during the peninsular war. The experiment was made at the Brighton depot, upon ten horses, during a period of three months. Each got eight pounds per day at four rations. They took to it very readily, and it was remarked that their coats became fine, smooth, and glossy. They got no grain, and only seven pounds of hay, instead of the ordinary allowance, which is twelve pounds. The sugar seemed to supply the place of grain so well, that it would probably have been given to the horses abroad; but peace came, and the circumstances which rendered the use of sugar for grain desirable ceased. The horses returned to their usual diet; but several of those who were the subjects of this experiment became crib-biters. [Sugar wants nitrogen, but abounds in carbon. It would not, therefore, answer as a horse food. The food must contain nitrogen to form muscle.]

That the sugar might not be appropriated to other purposes it was slightly scented with assafretida, which did not produce any apparent effect upon the horses.

"Fruit, as pumpkins, apples, etc, and sweet potatoes in America, figs and chestnuts in Spain and Italy, apples in some parts of France, and numerous other fructified exotics, are occasionally employed as food for horses."* Horse Chestnuts, it is said, "would probably form a valuable article of medicinal food for horses. In Turkey the nuts are ground, and mixed with other food; and they are regarded as a remedy for broken wind, and serviceable to horses troubled with coughs." † Haws, the fruit of the hawthorn, have been employed by West, of Hampshire, as an article of food for farm-horses, with what profit I have not learned. " The people of Medjid feed their horses regularly on dates. At Deyrach, in the country of the Flassae, dates are mixed with the clover. Barley, however, is the most usual food in all parts of Arabia.":‡