PREVENTION OF SLIPPING. sji 



short time after this shoe had fallen into disuse, another 

 inventor introduced a ' hipposandal ' system of shoeing ; 

 a large establishment was opened for the manufacture of 

 this article, and Paris was duly placarded with the marvel- 

 lous results to be derived from the application of this 

 humane invention to the feet of horses. It had but a 

 Aery brief existence, and was quickly forgotten. Then 

 another shoe was proposed to prevent slipping. This was 

 almost identical with the winter shoe in use in Canada, in 

 having its ground-surface quite concave, and the animal 

 resting on nothing but a sharp margin, which could not 

 fail to give excellent foothold so long as it lasted. Un- 

 fortunately this was only for a brief period, as the shoe 

 was made of iron. Had it been manufactured of steel, as 

 the Canadian shoe is, it w^ould, in all likelihood, have proved 

 too slippery for the pavement. 



The prevention of slipping has determined, more or 

 less, the form of nearly all the shoes and methods of shoeing 

 proposed in recent times. Indeed, it appears to have been, 

 next to the preservation of the wall of the hoof, the chief 

 desideratum from the very earliest period. We have ob- 

 served that the primitive shoes had calkins to grasp the 

 earth, and, in addition, well-lodged nail-heads, that stood 

 high above the level of the shoe, and while keeping the 

 animal's foot on a plane parallel with the ground, endowed 

 it with the grasping powers of a double row of catches such 

 as no modern shoeing has furnished. A farrier of Tours 

 some years ago endeavoured to imitate this very primitive 

 mode, and made nails with an iron shank and a large steel 

 head. These, their inventor said, possessed two advantages : 

 I . They preserved the shoe from wear, as the heads of the 



