HORSES AND THEIR FEET. 475 



his pages nothing which they may charge with extravagance, rashness, 

 and intolerance. They will not be told that unless they abandon the 

 system of shoeing altogether they can effect no improvement in the 

 present state of things, or even that they must hasten to change the 

 old system for the new. On the contrary, they will find that they are 

 again and again warned against imprudent haste, and are told that a 

 vast amount of good may be achieved even if they never venture on 

 leavinof their horses' feet in a state of nature. 



Of these arguments and facts it might be difficult to determme 

 which are the most important and significant. Certain it is that our 

 horses generally are afflicted with a multitude of diseases which seize 

 on their legs and feet, and that lameness is everywhere a cause of con- 

 . stant complaint and of loss of time and money. The author is not 

 speaking from theory or from book, but takes his stand on an experi- 

 ence obtained during a sojourn of many years in foreign countries, es- 

 pecially in America, where in the construction of railways and other 

 public works he had to employ hundreds of horses and mules on tasks 

 which taxed theii capabilities to the utmost. In Mexico, Peru, Brazil, 

 and elsewhere, he found that unshod horses were daily worked over 

 roads of all kinds, carrying heavy packs from the interior down to the 

 coast, the journey thither and back being often extended to several 

 hundreds of miles, and that they accomplish these journeys without 

 ever wearing out their hoofs ; and the roads in these countries, where 

 they exist at all, are neither softer nor smoother than those of England 

 or of Ireland. If horses fell lame, it was from causes incidental to the 

 climate, and for these the system of shoeing would supjaly no remedy. 

 From other diseases, which from strong and often incontestable rea- 

 sons may be traced to the use of shoes, they were wholly free. The 

 necessary conclusion was that the system of shoeing could answer no 

 good purpose, while it might be productive of much haim ; and in 

 this conclusion he was confirmed by the admissions and protests of the 

 most able and competent veterinary surgeons in this country. These 

 have uniformly raised their voices against the heavy weighting of the 

 horse's foot maintained by the traditional practice. It has been found 

 here that the hoofs of some horses are so weak that they can not be 

 fully shod ; and a writer in the " Field," styling himself " Impecunio- 

 sus," cited some ten years ago a remark by Mayhew that " some horses 

 will go sound in tips that can not endure any further protection," add- 

 ing the significant comment that the moral of this is that "it is the 

 shoe, not the road, that hurts the horse " ; for, if a weak and tender 

 foot can go sound when all but unshod, " why should not the strong, 

 sound one do the same ? " The conclusion, as he insists, should rather 

 be that a horse must have a strong, sound foot to stand, not our work, 

 but our shoe. The same writer, speaking of the cruelties unwittingly 

 perpetrated by grooms and blacksmiths on the horse's foot, says that, 

 " though lameness usually attends their efforts, they ascribe it to every 



