Walls should be composed of bricks, glazed on the inside, as such do not hold any dirt. Posts should be of oak, in preference to iron--and of the same stout material divisions of stalls and boxes should be made. If expense is not an object, however, brick will be better still for the construction of these.
The roof of a four-horse stable should be at least ten feet high, and that of a six-horse twelve to fourteen, which will be ample. When too lofty, a cold atmosphere prevails; when too low there is need for very large ventilators, which create a current, not always either safe or pleasant.
I do not at all approve of paved flooring, although it is so general. Roughened asphalte is the best; or a most perfect floor may be made by laying a concrete foundation, made up with gas-tar, some three or four inches thick, with stable clinkers set and bedded in it, and the whole grounded in with Portland cement.
I am a great advocate for box stalls, and would never allow an animal of mine to be tied up by the head. It is a barbarous and cruel practice, leading to all kinds of evils, both visible and concealed. A box should be _at least_ twelve feet by fourteen, and I prefer it much larger. If it be of brick, it ought to be lined with wood, and this again with zinc in all places that the horse can use his teeth upon. Projections of every kind should be avoided, as they are apt to be injurious when the occupant moves rapidly, or rolls to refresh himself. In a stalled stable a box may be made by converting the end stall into one. This can readily be done by having a gate that can be hung on the stall-post and fastened against the wall. A screen, hung on rollers from a top bar, is better than a door for closing up a box-stall. It never gets out of order, nor can any horse--even the most ingenious--succeed in opening it when once it is let down.
Where stalls are used they ought to be at least ten feet in length, and six and a-half or seven in width. The flooring of stalls should never slant to any perceptible degree. When it does there is a continual strain upon the back sinews and flexor muscles of the horse, and this he strives to relieve by moving backwards, and resting his hind toes in the gutter,--a practice which grooms call a vice.