CHAPTER V. 

 The Form and Manufacture of Shoes. 



Horse-shoes are made either by hand or machinery. 

 In this country most are hand-made — the front shoes 

 from new bar-iron, and the hind from old siioes welded 

 together and drawn out under heavy hammers. Probably 

 no method of working iron gives such good results as 

 this in producing a hard, tough shoe that will withstand 

 vrear. The custom of the trade is to keep a stock of 

 shoes suitable for all the regular customers. From this 

 stock are selected sizes and forms, which are then specially 

 fitted for each foot. 



Various materials have been tried in the production 

 of horse -shoes. Leather, compressed and hardened, has 

 been tried, and failed. Vulcanite was experimented with 

 unsuccessfully. Paper, or more correctly, a compressed 

 papier mdche, has also been tested, but proved "unsatisfac- 

 tory. Steel has been pretty largely tried in many 

 different forms, but it is dihicult to temper. As nearly 

 all shoes are applied immediatoiy after being fitted, they 

 have to be rapidly cooled in vrater, and steel treated in 

 this way is raad.e so hard that, if the shoes do not break, 

 the;f are dangerously slippery on most paved streets. As 

 a material for shoes good malleable iron has no equal. 

 It can be obtained in bars of various sizes to suit any 

 form and weight of shoe, and tlie old shoes made from it 

 may be worked up over and over again. 



The chief objects to be attained in any particular 

 pattern or form of shoe are— that it be light, easily and 

 safely retained by a few nails, capable of wearing three 

 weeks or a month, and that it afford good foot-hold to 

 the horse. All sJioes should be soundly worked and free 

 from flaws. 



The first shoes were doubtless appl led solely to protect 

 the foot from wear. The simplest arrangement would 



then be either a thin plate of iron covering the ground 



5a 



