94 HANDBOOK OF THE TURF. 



Float ; Flote. A light dressing-frame for finishing the 

 face of a track. Usually made in sections twelve feet square, 

 of 3 by 3 joist, the middle bar of which has two rows of sharp, 

 fine teeth. Often three of these floats are attached together, 

 one at the rear and outside of the other ; and the float and har- 

 row are often combined in one. 



Floating". The act of rasping or filing the horse's teeth 

 to give them a uniform and regular surface. When the teeth 

 become irregular with ragged and sharp edges from uneven 

 wearing, and they begin to cut and lacerate the cheeks on the 

 inside, producing ulceration and inflammation, the horse does 

 not gather or masticate his food properly, and is soon out of 

 condition in consequence. To ascertain this, place the front 

 finger of the right hand inside the horse's upper lip and shove it 

 along his grinders of the upper jaw, and if they appear ragged 

 and sharp on the inside corners, it is an indication that they 

 should be repaired. 



Fly-float. One who really knows little or nothing about 

 racing, but who fancies himself thoroughly initiated in all its 

 mysteries. 



Fly the Track. AVhen a horse in a race bolts instantly 

 to one side, he is said to " fly the track." 



Flyer. A fast horse. 



Foal. The young of the horse kind. 



Foot. The terminal part of the leg upon which the body 

 rests. While from the standpoint of the comparative anatomist 

 the foot of the horse includes all the leg from the knee and 

 hock down, what is called the foot being in reality the last 

 joint of the toe ; from the standpoint of the practical horseman 

 the foot is understood to mean the hoof. Its internal frame- 

 work consists of the small pastern, or lower end of the coronet 

 bone ; the coffin or pedal bone which is within the hoof, and 

 the small sesamoid or navicular bone extending across the back 

 part of the coffin-bone. In the rear of the hoof is the support- 

 ing framework known as the elastic cushion or frog. Within 

 this outward box or hoof the union of all the parts of the foot 

 is secured by a series of from five to six hundred minute leaves, 

 (laminae), a complete fibrous network of secreting surfaces, 

 soft, yielding and tough, the whole forming one of the most 

 wonderful pieces of mechanism found in the whole animal 

 economy. A description of all the parts of the foot Mill be 

 found under their several names in different parts of this work. 

 The defects of the foot may be severally due to wrong propor- 

 tions of conformation or axis, and of the quality of the horn. 

 Thus the foot may be too large, too small, too narrow, unequal ; 



