394 HEALTH AND DISEASE 



forces becomes upset, then it is that deformity and disease usurp the place 

 of symmetry and health. 



The causes that conduce to this unhealthy state are several, the first 

 and most pernicious being the operation of shoeing. 



Here the very means designed to defend the foot expose it to the worst 

 forms of abuse, viz. removal of the frog or sole, cutting away the "bars", and 

 rasping the surface of the crust. By paring down the frog, this all-impor- 

 tant organ, by nature intended to meet the ground, and by so doing to 

 open out the heels, is thrown out of action; wasting and shrinking, the 

 consequences of inactivity of the mutilated parts, then soon appear, to be 

 followed by obvious contraction. If, as is usual, the bars, which may be 

 deemed to be the buttresses of the heels, are also pared and weakened, the 

 mischief is profoundly aggravated; and it is still more so, when to these 

 habitual evils of shoeing is added the equally grave one of rasping the 

 surface of the crust. By this mischievous practice the natural defence 

 against evaporation of moisture from the foot is removed and a state of 

 morbid dryness induced, which not only conduces to brittleness of the 

 hoof, but also to contracting of the already weakened heels. 



Long-continued standing and forced rest, which some horses experience, 

 broken only at intervals by short periods of exercise, lend themselves to 

 this evil consequence by throwing the entire foot out of use. Inactivity, 

 especially when accompanied by high feeding, sooner or later ends in abid- 

 ing congestion of the feet. This is followed by wasting of the sensitive 

 parts, contraction of the hoof, and slowly-developed lameness, the cause of 

 which is seldom suspected. In presence of the abuses referred to, work, like 

 idleness, brings about the same result. Removed from contact with the 

 ground, the frog ceases to perform its natural office, and while both feet and 

 legs endure the jar against which it was designed to protect them, it at the 

 same time shrinks and wastes for want of work, ending sooner or later in 

 atrophy, deformity, and disease. To avoid contraction of the feet, the frog 

 must be allowed to come to the ground, the bars must be preserved in their 

 natural strength, and paring the sole and rasping the surface of the crust 

 must be forbidden. Long standing in stalls should, as far as possible, be 

 guarded against, and where rest is to be unbroken, the shoes should be re- 

 moved and the horse allowed his liberty, either in a box well littered with tan 

 or peat-moss, or in a yard or soft pasture where every part of the foot would 

 be brought into action. On the Continent, and more recently in England, 

 mechanical contrivances have been devised and applied with the object of 

 restoring contracted feet to their normal condition. The means employed 

 for this purpose is a shoe made with two movable heels having on the foot 

 surface a small sloping wedge which is brought to bear on the inner sides of 



