296 THE BARS. 



THE CORONET, OR CORONARY RING. 



The crust does not vary much in thickness until near the top 

 where it rapidly gets thin. It is in a manner scooped or hollowed 

 Fi^. 48. o^t- ^^ likewise changes its color and consis 



tence, and seems almost like a continuation of 

 the skin, but is easily separated from it by mu- 

 ceration, (steeping or soaking in a fluid,) or by 

 disease. The upper and thin part is called the 

 coronary ring, x Fig. 37. It extends round the 

 upper portion of the hoofs, and receives, within 

 it, or covers, a thickened or bulbous prolongation 

 of the skin, called the coronary ligament (see b, 

 in the accompanying cut). This prolongation ol 

 the sKiii — it is nothing more — is thicldy supplied with blood-ves- 

 sels. It is almost a mesh of blood-vessels connected together b\ 

 fibrous texture, and many of them are employed in secreting oi 

 forming the crust or wall of the foot. Hence it is, that in sand- 

 crack, quitor, and other diseases in which strips of the crust are 

 destroyed, it is so long in being renewed, or groichig doivn. It 

 must proceed from the coronary ligament, and so gradually creep 

 down the foot with the natural growth or lengthening of the 

 horn, of which, as in the human nail, a supply is slowly given to 

 answer to the wear and tear of the part. 



THE BARS. 



At the back part of the foot the wall of the hoof, instead of 

 continuing round and forming a circle, is suddenly bent in as in 

 Fig. 47, where d represents the base of the crust, and e its inflec- 

 tion or bending at the heel. The bars are, in fact, a continuation 

 of the crust, forming an acute angle, and meeting at a point at 

 the toe of the frog — see a, b, and c, in Fig. 47, and the inside of 

 the bars, like the inside of the crust, (see Fig. 46.) presents a con- 

 tinuance of the horny leaves, showing that it is a part of the same 

 substance, and helping to discharge the same office. 



It needs only the slightest consideration of the cut, or of the 

 natural hoof, to show the importance of the bars. The arch 

 which these form on either side, between the frog and the quar- 

 ters, is admirably contrived both to admit of, and to limit to its 

 proper extent, the expansion of the foot. When the foot is 

 placed on the ground, and the weight of the animal is thrown on 

 the leaves of the inside of the bars, these arches will shorten and 

 widen, in order to admit of the expansion of the quarters — ^the bow 

 returning to its natural curve, and powerfully assisting the foot in 



