Upon the summit of the abscess appears a black spot. It is at this spot the larva receives the air needed to support a dormant existence. This fact being known to certain people, the knowledge is employed to destroy the parasite. The swelling is first slightly greased, and then a drop of melted tallow is let fall upon the breathing place. By such means the insect is effectually suffocated, and assuredly dies. Others employ a darning needle as the instrument of execution. The needle is thrust through the central spot into the swelling for three-eighths of an inch. The larva thereby is pierced, and the life certainly is sacrificed. Neither method occasions at the time the slightest pain to the horse, and therefore may by some persons be esteemed highly humane; but, in the end, such plans of cure prove the very reverse. In either case the maggot dies; but the business, unfortunately, is only rendered worse by killing the source of evil. The dead body putrefies. A foreign and corrupting substance beneath the skin may enlarge the abscess to many times its original dimensions. After all, the system has to cast forth the irritating matter, and for that purpose inflammation, with its attendant fever, must be perfected. Much suffering is thus occasioned, and the proprietor is, for several weeks, forced to forego the employment of a valuable servant. The safest, the surest, and the quickest manner of eradicating these parasites is, with the point of a lancet, slightly to enlarge the central opening, and then with the finger and thumb, applied on either side of the swelling, to squeeze out the intruder. The abscess rapidly disappears; and it only requires a few dabbings with the solution of chloride of zinc, one grain to the ounce, to close the wound. However, the best manner to avoid such annoyances is not to endeavor at saving money by treating a domesticated animal as though it were an untamed quadruped. WARTS. A =wart=, when of a fixed cartilaginous nature, should, in the horse, be eradicated immediately upon its appearance; being permitted to exist, such growths always increase in number and in magnitude. By certain people, or rather by a tradition, these excrescences are imagined to breed, or it is thought that one can produce many. That warts are possessed of any such inherent property science refuses to acknowledge; but the same system which has generated one may generate several. The faculty of casting forth such growths may even be encouraged by allowing them to remain; and it is possible that the slight shock occasioned by their removal may alter the tendency of the body. Certain it is that, by some mysterious law, nature refuses to build up only for human agency to destroy. Youatt asserts that it was once fashionable to crop the ears of horses until animals were ultimately born with the ears ready shortened. [Illustration: PORTRAIT OF THE HEAD OF A HORSE WITH WARTS.]