been hitherto unacquainted with them, seem to consider this as correct action. This forced and unnatural amount of play upon the articulations can but cause serious injury, especially to the tendons and synovially lubricated surfaces generally. In fact, it is undue wear and tear all round, even on the muscles, which carry us up to the heart, and on the nerves, which carry us up to the brain.
What chance, then, have these poor animals of showing what they may be worth? They are only an experiment as yet, and are all young; and, through a very unfair treatment, it will be presently discovered that they have not answered expectations. This will not be the fault of the mules, but their misfortune. They are already a partial failure, as may be seen from the fact that in many cases three of them are employed on a two-horse car, and two of them on a one-horse car; but a good deal of this is to be accounted for from the fact that people of the gobe-mouche fraternity fancy that a mule consumes less provender than a horse. It is true that a mule can, upon an emergency and for a short time, make a shift upon shorter and lower quality rations than a horse can; but, take him all the year round, he not only cannot do so, but requires more than the horse. On this account mules are useful in foreign countries where privations may be expected on journeys; but, put them to regular work and regular feed, and then the writer has always found them, during a very extensive experience, to require more sustenance than a horse doing the same work.
