The pig has also four hoofs—two for the great digits and two for the lateral digits. They recall those of the ox.
CHAPTER IV
PROPORTIONS
Inasmuch as we have taken for granted, in connection with the present volume, that before entering on the study of the anatomy of quadrupeds the reader was prepared for it by a sufficient knowledge of human anatomy, it is quite natural that we should extend the same supposition to the study of proportions.
For this reason, the definition of proportions, considered from a general point of view, their signification, their function and their utility, are questions which it would be superfluous to enter upon here. We will content ourselves by calling to mind that the common measure chosen by preference is the length of the head, and that, ordinarily, it is with it that we compare the dimensions of other parts.
Among the animals whose structure we have examined, there is one of which the proportions deserve to be marked in preference to every other: this is the horse.
Wherefore this preference? In the first place, it is because of the overwhelming position which this animal occupies in the artistic representation of quadrupeds; that it is more frequently associated with man; that, notwithstanding its division into different races, its general proportions may be referred to a special type.
It is also because the indications relative to these proportions will suffice to show the way which the artist must follow in order to find for himself, at the time when the necessity for it arises, the proportions which characterize the other animals.