—of a horse, have been hitherto (but not with strict propriety) used in a similar sense: nice observers might say one begins where the other ends, or that one immediately succeeds the other. The haunch is that part of the hind quarter extending from the point of the hip-bone, down the thigh to the hock; but as it is a part well known, and but little subject to partial disease or accident, it lays claim to no particular description. The term of "putting a horse upon his haunches," implies the making him constantly fix the principal weight of the frame upon his hind quarters, by which practice he bears less upon the bit, and becomes habitually light in hand. Horses hard in mouth, and heavy in hand, frequently undergo the ceremony of being put upon their haunches in the trammels of a RIDING SCHOOL, where, by too severe and inconsiderate exertions, sudden twists, distortions, and strains, are sustained in the HOCKS, which terminate in CURBS and SPAVINS never to be obliterated.
HAUNCH of VENISON
—implies the hind quarter of a FALLOW DEER, (either buck or doe,) cut in a particular form for the table. The hind quarter of a STAG, or HIND, also passes under the same denomination; but it is more applicable to form a distinction, and call the former a haunch of venison; the latter, a haunch of red deer.
HAW
.—The haw is that cartilaginous part of a horse's eye, plainly perceptible at the inner corner next the forehead, which internally constitutes a circular groove for the easier acceleration of the eye in its orbit. When confined within its natural and proper sphere, it is but just in sight, when taking a front view of the horse; but when it has acquired a preternatural degree of enlargement, it protrudes over part of the orb, partially obstructs the sight, particularly in that direction, and constitutes no small disfiguration of the horse. Ingenuity heretofore suggested the possibility of extirpation with the knife, which operation has been frequently performed, but with too little success to justify a continuance of the practice. It having been found, that when the haw was taken away by a regular process, and by the hand of the most expert OPERATOR, yet the eye, for want of its former support, was observed to become contracted in the socket, and a total deprivation of sight to follow, evidently demonstrating "the REMEDY worse than the DISEASE;" as well as to convince us, it is sometimes more prudent
- "—— to bear those ills we have,
- Than fly to others that we know not of."
HAWKS
,—as birds of prey, are divided into two sorts, called long and short winged hawks: of the former there are ten, and of the latter eight; but their names, and particular description, is so remote from the language and manners of the present time, and their use so nearly obsolete, that the least animadversion would prove entirely superfluous.
HAWKING
—was some centuries since a sport of much fashion and celebrity; the HAWKS being as regularly broke and trained to the pursuit and taking of game, as are the best SETTERS and POINTERS of the present day. It is, however, so completely grown into disuse, and buried in oblivion, that there does not appear the least glimmering of its ever attaining a chance of SPORTING resurrection.