196 - HORSES AND ROADS. 



must be let alone altogether. But in the case of 

 the toe it is different, for attrition will not suffice to 

 keep down an exuberant growth, and the rasp is, 

 therefore, needed to remove it. All that have had 

 the experience are agreed upon that point. 



Bracy Clark dedicated the best part of his life 

 to the task of producing a perfect horseshoe. He 

 did not succeed in this task, any more than he 

 succeeded in seeing the fall force of his own argu- 

 ments. In this he was rivalled later on by Miles, 

 who wrote : — ' The principal argument upon which 

 the uninformed ground their objection to bringing 

 in the heels of the shoe is the necessity which they 

 affirm to exist for affording the horse more support 

 at the heels than Nature has given him, and which 

 they say my plan entirely deprives him of. Now, 

 what does this argument amount to ? Neither more 

 nor less than a declaration that the Almighty Creator 

 of the Universe has failed in imparting to the horse's 

 foot the form best suited to its requirements, and 

 has delegated to the puny intellect of man the task 

 of devising a remedy. Surely the stoutest sticklers 

 for the infallibility of old plans and old prejudices 

 will shrink from subscribing to such a doctrine as 

 this.' Mayhew wrote : — 'A return to perfect freedom 

 could alone cure the evils caused by unnatural re- 

 straint,^ Still, after expressing himself thus, Mayhew 

 *-went home and invented another ^hoe,' as Mr. 

 Fearnley says, but one which never came into use, 

 and never will. 



