SHOEING. 



101 



does this sometimes happen, that the smith is occasionally puzzled to 

 find the place where a nail will hold. 



It is a common thing to hear veterinary surgeons, throughout the 

 length and breadth of the land, attribute to the operation of shoeing all 

 the evils by which the hoof is affected. They generally assert that a 

 colt invariably has an open, healthy foot, until it is shod ; but, from the 

 day upon which the animal enters the forge, the horn begins to be 

 irregularly secreted, and the hoof to grow, misshapen; while horsemen 

 have a well-known saying, that " one horse could wear out four pair of 

 feet." 



Every rider knows how vexatious it is for a horse to fling a shoe. 

 Every horseman appreciates the consequence of walking his steed, even 

 one mile, along the common road, to gain the nearest forge, where the 

 loss may be made good. Such an accident were an impossibility, if the 

 nails were firm. There is always danger, as they are at present fixed, 

 of these fastenings breaking away from the substance of the hoof; yet 

 no one has hitherto ventured to question the existing method of shoeing 

 prevalent throughout Europe. 



But the worst evil which results from a shoe becoming partially re- 

 leased, is neither the inconvenience it 

 occasions the rider, nor fracture, often 

 produced, on the hoof of the animal. 

 Some portion of the horn first yields. 

 This mishap throws greater stress upon 

 the remaining fastenings. The shoe be- 

 comes loose. The majority of the nails 

 give way, but one may continue firm. 

 This is the greatest peril. The shoe is 

 fastened as by a pivot, and with every 

 step swings from side to side. The re- 

 leased nails stick upward — ^the' earth or 

 roadway, as well as the clinches, pre- 

 venting these from leaving their places. 

 When the foot is in the air, the shoe 

 hangs pendulous. When the foot is 

 placed upon the ground, it may be impaled upon the nails that protrude 

 upward. Many steps are seldom taken without such a result. The 

 shoe gets under the foot. The blunt and jagged points are, by the huge 

 freight of the quadruped, forced through the soft sole or frog at the bot- 

 tom of the hoof; a dangerous wound is inflicted, the uneven metal being 

 often driven for some distance into the body of the coffin-bone. 



Against the Arabian method of driving the nails, it may be advanced 



THB SHOE PABTIALLT BREAKS FROM THE 

 INSECURE FASTENINGS, AND ONE OF 

 THE NAILS, STICKING UP, PIERCES THE 

 SOLE OF THE FOOT. 



