THE HOOF OF THE HORSE. 71 



unshod horses galloping over the softest or roughest 

 kind of ground in turn (say Dartmoor, for instance) 

 may bear witness to. Such horses only roughly pick 

 their way when at full gallop : they lift their feet 

 high, and let them come down where chance may, 

 in detail, direct them. The weight of the horse is 

 only partially transmitted to the arched sole by the 

 elasticity of other parts of the foot. 



The hoof may be described as somewhat re- 

 sembHng a double slanting truncated conic section, 

 with the biggest end on the ground, and semi-cloven 

 behind. To superficial observers this may not be 

 suggestive of great resisting powers to the super- 

 imposed weight of the horse ; but, if we look inside 

 the hoof, we find that things are all right — how 

 could Nature possibly go wrong ? The inside of the 

 crust, instead of being smooth like the outside, is 

 furnished with several hundreds of thin, flexible, 

 horny plates, called laminae, set edgewise, very like 

 the gills of a mushroom ; whilst the coffin bone is 

 covered with an exactly corresponding number of 

 softer plates, which fit with the utmost nicety 

 between, and adhere most closely to, the first- 

 mentioned plates. This beautiful arrangement gives 

 an adhesive surface on both the crust and the coffin 

 bone, many thousands of times greater than the 

 hoof measures in girth ; and thus the weight of the 

 horse is attached to, and suspended by, the crust, 

 and only partially coming down on the frog and 

 sole at times, and in irregular amount and force, 

 and always finding delicate compound arrangements 



