524 AET OF SHOEING. 



in the many, amongst whom every phase of the subject 

 might be expected to have its adherent. 



The whole foot of the horse should be viewed in its proper 

 aspect, embracing structures above the hoof as well as those 

 enveloped by it ; details may advantageously precede general 

 arrangements, in which way the separate parts of the foot 

 should be investigated, they being to the physiologist what 

 the letters of the alphabet are to the scholar the first steps 

 of the ladder, the parts are learnt separately, and then blended 

 as the understanding puts the knowledge into useful form. 



Nature has furnished the horse with hoofs, which are en- 

 dowed with given degrees of substance, density, toughness, 

 and elastic properties, differing in their different parts, so as 

 to assimilate the functions of the outer with the inner 

 structures. On that animal, more than others, is conferred 

 a double framework to the foot, an inner bony skeleton and 

 an outer encasement of horn, and these mutually act in sus- 

 taining and supporting the great exertions which the foot, as 

 the support and lever, undergoes. 



Subordinate to the sustaining structures just referred to, 

 those more pliable are brought into their assigned action, 

 viz., the ligaments and cartilages, amongst which may be 

 comprised that immensely powerful structure, the frog, with 

 the intercurrent ligamentous bands which take their attach- 

 ments from the lateral cartilages, and converge to the centre ; 

 this anatomical formation is shown, and the functions de- 

 scribed in the Edinburgh Veterinary Review for 1861, at 

 page 511, though a single illustration, however well exe- 

 cuted from nature, is totally inadequate to do more than 

 aid the text, to indicate how each investigator may suc- 

 ceed in finding out the parts by his own subsequent dis- 

 sections. 



The hoof of the horse may be described according to its 



