CLINCHING HORSE SHOE NAILS. 



As I once passed througli this town, one of my horses' shoes became 

 loose, and I went to the shop of a smith named Lovelace, to get it 

 fastened. The shoe was nearly new, and had become loose in con- 

 sequence of the nails having drawn out of the hoof, although they 

 had been clinched in the manner universally practiced. The smith 

 remarked that all the other shoes were loose, and would soon drop 

 off, when I requested him to take them off and replace them ; and 

 then did I perceive the different mode which he adopted for fixing 

 them, which I will here detail. As fast as he drove the nails, he- 

 merely bent the points down to the hoof, without, as is customary, 

 twisting them with the pincers ; these he then drove home, clinching 

 them against a heavy pair of pincers, which were not made very 

 sharp ; and after this had been very carefully done, he twisted off 

 each nail as close as possible to the hoof; the pincers being dull, the 

 nail would hold, so as to get a perfect twist round before it separat- 

 ed. These twists were then beaten close to the hoof and filed smooth, 

 but not deep, or with the view to rasp off the twist of the nail. " Oh 

 ho ! " said I, " I have learned a lesson in horse-shoeing." " Yes," 

 said he, and a valuable one; if I were ever to lose a single shoe in a 

 long day's hunt, I should have to shut up my shop; my business is 

 to shoe the horses belonging to the hunt, and the loss of a shoe 

 would be the probable ruin of a horse, worth perhaps a thousand 

 pounds; but I never am fearful of such an accident." " Simply be- 

 cause you drive home and clinch the nails before you twist them 

 off," said I. " Yes," replied he, " by which I secure a rivet as well as 

 clinch. " The thing was as clear as the light of day, and I have sev- 

 eral times endeavored to make our shoeing smiths understand it, but 

 they can not see the advantage it would be to themselves, and guess, 

 therefore, it wotdd never do in these jyorts. Now, let any one take up 

 an old horse shoe at any of the smith's shops on the road, and ex- 

 amine the clinch of the nails which have drawn out of the hoof, and 

 he will soon perceive how the thing operates. In short, if the nails 

 are driven home before twisting off, and the rivet formed by the tiotsf, 

 be not afterwards removed by the rasp, I should be glad to be told 

 how the shoe is to come off at all. unless by first cutting out the 

 twist? — Farmers^ Cabinet. 



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