632 HORSE-SHOES AND HORSE-SHOEING. 



hoof is practised. Although protecting the horse's foot 

 from exposure to undue wear, and from the injuries which 

 would befall it if made to undergo hardships with which it 

 was not naturally designed to contend, yet, unless most 

 judiciously employed, much that belongs to shoeing is a 

 serious evil ; and the skill of man ought therefore to be 

 directed to the diminution or suppression of those preju- 

 dicial tendencies. For example, the employment of nails 

 to fasten on the shoe, however carefully managed, is to a 

 certain extent a source of injury to the hoof; but when 

 used indiscreetly, is positively ruinous to the animal. 

 No invention yet proposed has succeeded in retaining the 

 shoe so firmly as nails, and the many failures that have 

 resulted when other fastenings have been tried, leads to 

 the belief that no means at once so convenient and so 

 efficacious will readily be substituted for them. Again, 

 different models of shoes have been devised to meet 

 wants, real or imaginary, and to guard against the casual- 

 ties incidental to the employment of the ordinary shoe, 

 but without success ; for one after another they have all 

 been discarded, and the simple shoe, with all its defects, 

 and but slightly modified to suit particular cases, has 

 outlived them all. So that there appears but little 

 chance that anything more simple, useful, or less injuri- 

 ous than the ordinary shoe, when properly applied, will 

 ever stand the same prolonged test, or gain such universal 

 favour. 



But knowing the structure and uses of the several 

 parts of the hoof and its contents, as well as the physi- 

 ology and just proportions of the limbs, the skilful artisan, 

 taught by the veterinary surgeon, should be able to 



