DR. LEGEAR'S STOCK BOOK. 247 



CHAPTER XVIII. 

 HORSESHOEING. 



History tells us that the Romans made horseshoes and used 

 them on their horses about the eleventh and twelfth centuries. 

 The first shoe consisted of a thin plate, with a rim around the 

 outside, which covered the whole ground surface of the foot. 

 Around the outside of this plate rings or loops were fastened, 

 through which small ropes were drawn, and in this way the shoe 

 was fastened to the hoof and pastern. This mode of fastening 

 became unsatisfactory, and a substitute was found in the so-called 

 "Asiatic cap iron sole," which was also made of a plate of iron 

 covering the whole sole, with a rim around the outside of it about 

 one-half inch in height, and upon this rim, on both sides of the 

 shoe, rose three beak-like projections about one inch high, which 

 were fastened into the wall of the hoof in the form of a hook. 

 This mode of fastening also being insufficient, fastening of the 

 shoes by nails, as at the present time, was adopted. The iron 

 plates with rims were too thin to allow nails with sunken heads 

 to be used, so nails with cubical shaped heads were used. A shoe 

 containing a groove made its appearance first in Germany in the 

 fifteenth century, and from this time, as far as we know, ceases 

 the period of the Roman horseshoe. Its influence, however, has 

 even remained until our present day. The science of horseshoe- 

 ing at the present time is a question of vast importance, not only 

 to mechanics, but to every thinking mind. It is not fully real- 

 ized the amount of injury being done by poor horseshoeing. The 

 art of farriery is a branch of science which is very valuable to the 

 public. The public ought to support the educated farrier, one 

 who has studied the anatomy of the horse's hoof, is progressive, 

 skilled in his profession, and no other. Practical and scientific 



