HOCK-HOCKING. 39 



thougli it appeared impossible to get any flesh on him. Like his 

 half-sister, he was a long strider, and his improvement was also rapid. 

 At times there was an inclination to single-foot, and at fii'st he had a 

 dwelling motion in his stride. The application of the six-ounce toe" 

 weight would correct the first, and a tip beveled at the toe as shown 

 in the cut remedied the second. Being so poor, though he ate 2)lenty 

 of srain, I resti-icted his fast work to half miles, and in a few weeks 

 handling he dropped from a "three and a half gait" to half a mile in 

 1:21. I found it much easier to control his gait with the tips than 

 I ever had with shoes under the same circumstances. In all of these 

 colts' feet the frog was full and elastic, and the hoofs retained their 

 proper shape. This colt won a three-year-old stake under many 

 adverse circumstances. 



The case of Hock-Hocking presents the value of tips in a very 

 clear light, and though he received irrepai-able injuries before wearing 

 them, the history will show that he could be trained and run with 

 them when, with ordinaiy shoes, he soon became lame. When I first 

 got him — the Spring he was four years old — his feet were out oi 

 shape from the irregular gi-owth of horn, and owing to his antipathy 

 to have his feet handled the heels were too high and the quarters 

 somewhat contracted. Then it was a difficult job to shoe him, and 

 even with a twitch on his nose he gave the blacksmith a good deal of 

 trouble. His work was on a hard track, much harder than it 

 appeared, and he split his foot from the coronet to the ground. It is 

 needless to recapitulate the races he ran. He was continually shat- 

 tering his hoofs, and, notwithstanding the support of copper plates 

 screwed to the wall, they would fractui-e with almost every gallop. 

 He started in a race of two mile heats with Waterford and Wood- 

 bury, was close up in the first heat in 3:36| literally on three legs 

 In the second he split his other fore foot, and started the small meta. 

 carpal bone from the larger. 



The Spring of 1875 Mi\ Dunbar operated on him, and for months, 

 following instructions, we soaked his feet three times a day in hot 

 water, walking him on the beach when the tide was in, and taking 

 every pains to grow his feet anew. I put him in training in the 

 Fall, with shoes of the usual weight used in training race-horses, but 



