140 HORSE AND MAN. 



it bids defiance to hard and sharp-edged objects, such 

 as rocks or broken flints ; and in the next place, it 

 transmits the pressure from the frog to the wall, so 

 as to produce the expansion at each step on which 

 the health of the hoof depends. 



So the sole inspires man with another happy 

 thought. ' Let us pare it so thin that it not only 

 cannot resist the pressure of the horse's weight upon 

 a stone, but that it yields to the pressure of the 

 human thumb. As for its duty of transmitting 

 pressure from the frog to the wall, that is of no 

 consequence, as the frog has already been cut away, 

 so that there is no pressure to be transmitted.' 



Our happy thoughts are not yet exhausted. The 

 hoof has been made Porous, so as to permit tran- 

 spiration to take place. ' Happy thought ! Let us 

 choke up all the pores with oil to stop the transpi- 

 ration.' 



It has been covered with a natural Varnish so 

 constructed that while it does not hinder transpira- 

 tion, it defends the hoof from wet. ' Happy thought ! 

 Let us rasp or scrape off the varnish. It is natural, 

 and therefore must be wrong.' 



The coronary ring, from which the fibres of the 

 wall are secreted, is guarded by a Penthouse of Hair 

 which causes wet to shoot off it as it does from the 

 eaves of a house. ; Happy thought ! Let us snip away 



