414 ANNUAL REPORT OF THE Off. Doc. 



times necessary to shoe with a bar shoe, but iu most cases an open 

 pkite shoe or the centre bearing shoe No. 1 will bring the desired 

 results by setting the shoes as often as once in three or four weeks, 

 at each setting keeping the shoe well back under the heels, short- 

 ening the toe as much as possible. 



Then take a piece of toe steel 3-8 by ^ inch to make a hot lance by 

 drawing to a sharp edge about an inch across the point, then heat 

 to almost white heat, taking the foot on the knee as if in the act 

 of clinching the shoe, using the hot lance to cut across the top of the 

 crack just at the edge of the hair in the coronet, cutting through 

 so as to start the blood. Probably you will have to heat the lance 

 the second time to accomplish the result needed, then dress the 

 coronet with Aeterinary petroleum daily and White Rock Hoof Pack- 

 ing in the bottom so as to keep the bottom moist and soft. 



CORNS. 



A corn is an injury to the living horn of the foot, involving at the 

 same time the soft tissues beneath whereby the capillary blood ves- 

 sels are ruptured and a small amount of blood escapes, which by 

 permeating the corn in the immediate neighborhood, stains it a dark 

 color. If the injury is continuously repeated the horn becomes al- 

 tered in character, the soft tissues may suppurate, causing the dis- 

 ease to spread, or a horny tumor may develop. Corns always appear 

 in that part of the sole included in the angle between the bar and the 

 outside wall of the hoof. In many cases the laminae of the bar or 

 the wall, or of both, are involved at the same time. 



Three kinds of corns are commonly recognized; the dry, the moist 

 and the suppurative, a division based solely on the character of the 

 conditions which follow the primary injury. The forefeet are al- 

 most exclusively the subjects of the disease; for two reasons: 1st. 

 Because they support a greater part of the body. 2d. Because the 

 heel of the forefoot during progression is first placed upon the 

 ground whereby it receives much more concussion than the heel of 

 the hindfoot, in which the toe first strikes the ground. 



CAUSES. 



It may be said that all feet are exposed to corns and that even 

 the best feet may suffer from them when the conditions necessary 

 to the production of the peculiar injury are present. The heavier 

 breeds of horses, generally used for heavy work on rough roads and 

 streets, seem to be most liable to this trouble. 



Among the causes and conditions which predispose to corns may 

 be named, high heels, which change the natural relative position of 

 the bones of the foot and thereby increase the concussion to which 

 these parts are subject; contracted heels, which in part destroy the 



