146 SHOEING. 



shoeing, best adapted to the foot and action 

 of his own horse. I never considered it at 

 all necessary that a gentleman, sportsman, 

 tradesman, or traveller, is to commence black- 

 smith in theory, and go through the rudi- 

 ments of the trade to promote his inten- 

 tion ; that has hitherto been the systematic 

 mode of tuition : but when it isr considered 

 how very few will enter a wide field of ab- 

 struse study, to comprehend what he is told 

 is a proper method of shoeing his horse, it can 

 create no surprize that it has been attended 

 •with so little su£cess. 



My conception of the necessary know- 

 ledge is unequivocally this ;— although every 

 Smith in professional etiquette, may b^ 

 deemed an artist, 1 defy the force of /ogee . 

 itself to render every artist a conjurer ; and 

 as there must inevitably remain among the 

 collateral descendants from Vulcan (as in 

 most other professions) some prodigies of 

 brightness, who, incapable of distinguishing 

 rii£ht from wrong, shoe one horse as they shoe 

 another, or, in plainer English, shoe all alike \ 

 such discrimination becomes palpably useful, 

 as will enable the owners to give conditional 



