Effects of Hoof-Dressing. 119 



him candidly, ^^Yes;" then you may well ask 

 why do I use it ? '' Because my employer likes to 

 see it ; " and with the groom as well as the smith, 

 it is often doing things to suit their employer's 

 whim, or losing his work. So much for the use 

 of fat and tar, and other mixtures of its class. 

 Now, what about paring away the sole and frog ? 

 The prevalent idea of old writers was that one 

 pair of bones are attached to a larger one by a 

 yielding medium substance, which by stretching 

 admits of their descent, and that another pair — 

 the sessanoide — are suspended by an elastic liga- 

 ment, endowed with considerable elongating pro- 

 perties ; that the navicular bone is pressed down 

 on to the tendon beneath it, which in its turn 

 reposes on the frog ; and lastly that the coffin- 

 bone is slung by elastic medium bands to the 

 inner surface of the wall of the hoof ; that these 

 bands (the lamince) allow by their stretching 

 properties for the bones to descend, to admit of 

 which the sole of the hoof must be cut away and 

 otherwise weakened to avoid obstruction. Can 

 any rational man believe that this is the material 

 to harbour in men's brains as a foundation to 

 build a superstructure of any kind, either of 

 normal actions or diseased conditions ? ]N"o ; the 

 anatomy of the foot must be understood, from 

 phenomena we must arrive at systems, and then 

 we may learn pathology. Knowledge of healthy 

 actions first, then altered states, diseases, causes, 

 and sequences may be understood ; hence the 

 necessity of a class in the Eoyal Veterinary 

 College, where the aspiring groom and smith 



