540 



SHOEING FOR A SPECIFIC PURPOSE. 



Thanks to tbe amount of attention which every detail that could 

 possibly tend to the more perfect development of that paragon of horse- 

 flesh, the American trotter, has received at the hands of all classes of 

 men, the matter of shoeing for specific i)uri)0ses has made greater 

 progress in America than in any other country on the face of the globe, 

 and that is a department of the farrier's art which is justly entitled to 

 the highest eulogium that can be bestowed upon it. 



The different styles of shoes which have been devised are marvels of 

 ingenuity, and many of them are admirably effective as remedial agents 

 for faulty gaits and uneven action. Their number is infinite, but as 

 many are applicable only, or in a large measure, to horses used solely 

 for speed purposes, any attempt at classification or detailed description 

 would be out of place in a work of this kind. When intelligently ap- 

 lilied a considerable number are, however, liotentauxiliaries in mitigating 

 in some cases the results of natural defects of conformation amongst 

 animals whose lot ii cast in the humbler if more useful fields of horse 

 enterprise. Among these are the scoop-toed or roller-motion shoe for 

 the fore feet (Plate xxxxii. Fig. 2) and the shoe (Plate xxxxii, Fig. 

 3) for the hind feet, which, while they obviate "forging" or "clicking," 

 a habit hurtful to the horse and singularly annoying to his driver, do 

 not in any waj' tend to inflict injury on the feet or limbs. The scooped or 

 rolled toe confers a mechanical advantage, enabling the animal to get 

 over his toes more promptly and thus remove the front foot from the 

 stroke of the hind extremity, while the lengthening of the branches of 

 the hind shoes, by increasing the ground surface, retards the flexion 

 and extension of the hint! limbs. 



The common practice of increasing the weight of the outside web of 

 the hind shoes, to open the action (Plate xxxxii. Fig. 4), is equally 

 harmless and efficacious when not carried to extremes. 



Plate xxxxiii, Fig. 1, is the most effective model of shoe to square 

 and balance the gait of unmade horses, but the period of its use should 

 be strictly limited and the weight of the toe gradually reduced as the 

 desired gait becomes established. An ingenious shoe to prevent "dish- 

 ing" or "paddling" is shown in Plate xxxxtii, Fig. 2, but I can not 

 acknowledge so implicit confidence in its efticacy, as the vice is the re- 

 sult of a physical malformation, which mechanical means can go but a 

 small way to remove or palliate. 



There are many other styles of shoe, the product of American inge- 

 nuity, for which probably equal merit might be claimed, but there are 

 others, which, while they may cure or mitigate the special defect against 

 which they are directed, only do so at the expense of some other por- 

 tion of the structure. It has many a time furnished food for thought 

 to the writer, that, in this' great commonwealth, while there are such a 

 large number of artificers who make horse-shoeing a profession, who 



