SHOEING. 135 



prevent the ill effedl of literan^ impofition, or 

 milreprefentation, upon the credulity and in- 

 experienced judgment of individuals ; who 

 are in general, particularly the irn cultivated 

 clajfcs, (by far the moft numerous) difpofed 

 to believe every thing fandtioned with the au- 

 thority of the prefs and the name of the prin- 

 ter bears the incontrovertible flamo of infal- 

 libility. Under the influence of this reflec- 

 tion, and to prove the ftrid: juftice of the af- 

 fertion, it becomes directly in point to irate 

 fuch inconfillencies as evidently arife in re- 

 tro fpect ion. A writer of the prefent day 

 confidently tells us in his title-page, he is 

 ^* an experienced farrier of fifty years prac- 

 tice/* and promifes (according to cuftom) 

 a great deal more information and infliruction 

 than he ever condefcended to perform. He 

 then leads you through tw^o hundred pages 

 of dull, unintereiling, anatomical defcriptivey 

 obliquely copied from the elaborate work of 

 Gibson ; interlards the remaining hundred 

 and feventy pages with the almoil obfolete 

 prefcriptive parts of the ancient Syftem of 

 Farriery, (flightly varied to evade the charge 

 of dired: plagianfm) without the coinage of 

 K 4 a fww 



