ARTISTIC HORSE-SHOEING. 63 



STIFLE SHOE. 



Fig". 30 represents a stifle shoe. There is an old saying 

 that ''my horse has g-ot a stifle out." I was horn, you 

 might say, a blacksmith, and I have heard my father say 

 many a time that he had got to go out and put the old 

 horse's stifle in. Now I don't think the old gentleman ever 

 saw a horse with a stifle out. 



We have what w^e call stifle difficulties, but if the horse 

 gets his stifle out he will never do any more work. To get 

 tlie stifle out he has got to break a band of bone like the 

 knee-pan in man, and after this bone is broken it can 

 never be replaced. 



There are cords and muscles that draw over the stifle 

 the same Avay as the^^ do over the knuckles of the hand and 

 it is these that slip and get out of place, and to cure such 

 troubles a shoe is used made in the style shown in the illus- 

 tration. This is to be put on the well foot, the object being 

 to make the horse stand on the crippled foot and hold his 

 cords and muscles in their places until they are relaxed. 



Before using this shoe it is necessary to be ver^^ careful to 

 ascertain that the trouble with the horse relates to the 

 stifle. I have frequently seen cases where owners of horses 

 thought that the stifle was out of place and the only trou- 

 ble was that the horse had been pricked with a nail. 



FLAT TROTTING PLATE. 



Fig. 31 shoAvs a flat trotting plate or a shoe for pacers ; 

 can be made in the same style with light steel. With pa- 



