6 THE PRACTICAL HORSESHOER. 



At the time of Hannibal's invasion of the Roman Empire 

 horseshoeing- appears to have been unknown to the Cartha- 

 g-inians, as we read that that mighty warrior was some- 

 times compelled to give his famous cavalry horses a rest 

 to enable their feet to recover from the soreness occasioned 

 by rapid and prolonged marches. That the Arabs of the 

 Hegira (a.d. 622), or within a generation later, shod their 

 horses is plain, if we believe that the iron work on the sum- 

 mit of the standard of Hosien, at Ardbeil, was made from 

 a horseshoe belonging to Abbas, uncle of Mohammed, by 

 order of his daughter Fatima. It was brought, says the 

 legend, from Arabia by Sheik Sofi. It is probable, therefore, 

 that the art of shoeing must have been known among the 

 Arabs as early as the time of Mohammed. These people 

 say their first farrier came to them from the seaboard. 



The greatest and earliest difficulty in the management 

 of the horse's hoof seems to have been to combine a hard 

 substance for the wear and tear with a ready means of fast- 

 ening that would not injure the corneous substance, the 

 ancients feeling that to make a puncture in the hoof would 

 cause pain to the animal and otJierwise injure him ; yet 

 iron was found to be admissible. Tlie form of the Asiatic 

 horseshoe is circular, and instead of being fastened on by 

 means of nails driven through the hoofs, it is secured by the 

 clamps that appear to have closed on the outside or ascend- 

 ing surface. The exact counterpart of form, etc., existed at 

 the period of the Ionian Greeks. The making- of incisions 

 in the hoof for the sharp points of the clamps to obtain a 

 hold probably led to the knowledge that little or no pain 

 was caused to the horse, and thus holes were bored for the 

 nails, which became ever after the method of fastening. 



BARBAROUS EXTRAVAGANCE. 



The round horseshoe of old Arabian methods was an im- 

 provement on the Circassian, the outside clamps beings 



