100 THE HORSE 



wall must be lowered with the knife and the rasp and a 

 level bearing surface obtained. In fitting the shoe the 

 latter should be applied d± a dull red heat and the surface 

 lightly charred in order to produce the requisite bearing. 

 It must be borne in mind that the wall and the junction 

 of the wall and the sole are the weight-bearing structures 

 of the foot, and the shoe should press upon these struc- 

 tures only. Opening up the heels, as it is called, i.e. 

 paring away the " bars " is a most objectionable practice 

 and should never be done. The heels of the shoe should 

 never be too long, otherwise they will press on the heels 

 and lead to bruising of these. All horses, for preference, 

 should be shod perfectly flat, but it is a general practice 

 to put calkings on the heels. If this is done, a correspond- 

 ing piece should be put on the toe, in order not to disturb 

 the balance of the various structures in the limb. It 

 is quite true that horses get a better grip of the ground, 

 especially on granite sets in towns, but both calkings 

 and toe pieces destroy the proper functions of the frog 

 and favour contraction of the heel, so that whenever they 

 can be done without it is so m.uch the better. The weights 

 of shoes vary. For instance, race-horse shoes weigh about 

 4 oz. ; those for hunters and hacks, i lb. ; carriage 

 horses, i| lb. ; heavy draught horses, 3 to 4 lb. Shoes 

 may be plain or fullered. For hunters and race-horses 

 fullered shoes are nearly always used. The number of 

 nail holes is usually 3 on the inner side and 4 on the outer, 

 but in shoes used in the army, extra holes were provided, 

 in case of necessity. In shoeing hunters and polo ponies, 

 neat and close fitting is essential, more especially in the 

 latter, and this remark also applies to the fitting of shoes 

 for the race-horse. There is one mistake a farrier often 

 makes, and this is rasping the wall of the hoof, whereas 

 all that is requisite to do is to rasp it along the line of exit 

 of the nails. By rasping the wall, the foot's protective 

 varnish, viz. the periople is removed, the loss of which 

 tends to brittleness of the wall. Sometimes horses are 



