CALKS AND HOT SHOES. 35 



their researches as to the right way of shoeing. 

 Eace horses still slip (witness the Derby of 1879) both 

 backwards and forwards, and trainers have not yet 

 arrived at the acme of treatment of the horse's foot. 

 They will not like to be told so, but il n^y a que la 

 verite qui offense in instances of this kind. Lord 

 Pembroke hated calks, and he lays it down as a rule 

 that ' from the race horse to the cart horse the same 

 system of shoeing, and description of shoes, should 

 be observed ; the size, weight, and thickness only of 

 them should differ.' 



Nature intended the horse to serve for both 

 draught and saddle, and she designed for him a 

 wonderful foot, equally fitted for both purposes. 

 Man in his perversity is dissatisfied with it, and is 

 vain enough to think that he can alter it to ad- 

 vantage. And to what classes of men has the regula- 

 tion of such supposed improvements been abandoned, 

 but to the most ignorant ? To return to the forge : 

 when the farrier has satisfied himself that he has 

 cut away everything he can possibly get at, without 

 drawing blood — although often on the sole he goes 

 so far as to produce ' dewdrops ' of that, which may 

 be seen oozing through the pores he has cut deeply 

 into — and that he has obtained something near a fit 

 by altering both the shape of the shoe and the hoof, 

 he will then again put the shoe in the fire and give 

 a blow up to make it red hot ; and, in that red hot 

 state, he will apply it to the foot, in order to burn a 

 seat for it. In so doing it must be evident to every 

 man who will reflect, that he sets all the natural 



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