HORSE-SHOEING. 177 



of the leg or foot will be certain to suffer. Therefore, what- 

 ever device may be employed to prevent slipping and secure 

 a hold on the ground should not interfere with the natural 

 direction of the limb or foot. If calkins are deemed necessary, 

 then the front part of the shoe ought to be raised to a correspond- 

 ing height either by thickening its substance or adding a toe- 

 piece. In the majority of cases, however, the use of these pro- 

 jections is problematical, and it is certain that hundreds of horses 

 travel as safely without them as with them. In many of our 

 large towns and cities they are but little employed, and with 

 advantage to the legs and feet. For many years I have not 

 allowed a calkin to be worn on the shoe of any of the horses in 

 my charge, and no complaints of slipping or insecure footing have 

 ever been made, nor have any reports of horses falling down 

 either on slippery turf or the smooth surface of paved streets, 

 from the absence of calkins, ever reached me. Having studied 

 the subject of farriery practically for several years, in the large 

 cities of Glasgow and Manchester before entering the army, and 

 having during fifteen years' service been attached to those 

 branches in which light or riding-horses are employed, my op- 

 portunities for observation have been extensive. These oppor- 

 tunities have led me to form the opinion just given as to the 

 value of calkins. While stationed with my regiment in Edin- 

 burgh in 1864-65, I obtained permission to dispense with calkins 

 on the hind-shoes (they are not worn on the fore-shoes of cavalry- 

 horses), and though the orderly and other diities were somewhat 

 heavy on the streets of that city— which are perhaps the most 

 slippery in Britain— no accident occurred. 



For more than three years I have been stationed in a large 

 garrison town in the south of England with nearly three hundred 

 horses— most of which are draught— in my charge. The greater 



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