358 DADD'S VETERINARY MEDICINE AND SURGERY. 



Binding up the crack is a good practice after firing. With a 

 wax-end of sufficient length (such as shoemakers use) bind round 

 the wall of the hoof, so that any tar or pitch-plaster it may be 

 deemed advisable to place in or upon the crack may be maintained 

 there ; at, the same time the hoof itself is, by t: e tight binding 

 restricted in any tendency it may have to expand, and thereb) 

 open wider the crack. 



A bar-shoe is the preferable one for a sand-cracked foot. By 

 it, the bearing being taken off 1rhat part of the wall which is oppo- 

 site to the crack, the pressure and jar, so continually splitting 

 afresh the new-formed horn over the crack at the coronet, is put 

 a stop to, the formation of an undivided coronary horny band be- 

 ins- the commencement of the radical cure of the sand-crack. As 

 I said before, horn being an inorganic substance, no union what- 

 ever can take place in the crack itself. Permanent cure can be 

 effected only through obliteration by the growing out or down of 

 the crack. This/I repeat, is the reason why a sand-crack occupies 

 so long a time in its removal ; though, by way of compensation, a 

 horse is not kept out of work while cure is being effected ; for, 

 after the crack has been bound up, and the hoof shod with a bar- 

 shoe, it is quite surprising to find how soundly and firmly the 

 animal sometimes steps upon the foot of which he had but now 

 been so lame. 



The treatment adopted by the late Mr. Read, V. S., of Cred- 

 iton, carries the same object into execution, through a different 

 method of procedure. This, as detailed in the volume of the 

 'Veterinarian' for 1848, consists in simply isolating the fissure 

 within the segment of a circle, by means of an ordinary firing- 

 iron. The best plan is to operate with the heel of the iron, be- 

 ginning at the coronet with either extremity of the segment, and 

 bringing the iron to a finish at the center. The iron should be at 

 a strong red heat, and be carried through the horny crust until it 

 tDuches lightly the sensible laminae, and so throughout the entire 

 semicircle. As you recede from the coronet, so, in proportion, 

 you will require to deepen the fissure in the crust. The iron 

 ought to be applied every week or ten days. The first effect de- 

 sirable tc bt, produced is a bulging of the crust around the coronet 

 within the segment, and when once this is fairly established, the 

 cure may be said to be effected, it being seldom necessary to apply 

 the cantery afterward. The old method of making a 'ine with 



