194 HORSE AND MAN. 



and galloped on the road. So the hoofs are cracked, 

 and the cracks have extended.' 



The reader will perceive how an advocate of the 

 iron shoe would seize on this fact as a proof that 

 horses must be shod in order to enable them to carry 

 on their work. Whereas, if the horse had been in 

 the hands of anyone who understood the anatomy 

 of the hoof, and had been taken over a few miles of 

 hard roads daily, it might have traversed all the 

 roads in England, from the flats of Cambridge and 

 Essex to the hills of Devon, Stafford, and Derby- 

 shire, and have possessed better hoofs than when it 

 started, 



My vocation as lecturer takes me over all kinds 

 of roads in all parts of England and Scotland, not to 

 mention America, though I cannot say, as Dickens 

 did, that I have been upset out of every imaginable 

 conveyance that goes on wheels. Still, I do happen 

 to possess practical knowledge of the roads of 

 Devonshire, Derbyshire, and Staffordshire, all of 

 which are traversed daily by unshod horses doing 

 any kind of work. Here is an account of the 

 ordinary roads of North Staffordshire, extracted 

 from the ' Sporting and Dramatic News,' an acknow- 

 ledgedly 'horsey' authority. It is dated August 9, 

 1884, and signed by ' Rapier,' whose identity is well 

 known to all sporting men : 



