CHAPTER XV. 



SHOEING. 



Its Advantages and Its Disadvantages. 



Why necessary, common errors, preparing 1'he foot for thb 

 shoe, the shoe, finishing touches, winter shoeing, shoeing 

 for a specific purpose. 



MI,I.IAM DICKSON, the able veterinarian of the State Farmers' 

 Institute of Minnesota, has the following to say on this impor- 

 portant subject : 



' 'It has sometimes been asserted that the history of every horse 

 is a record of human endeavor to mar his utility. While the accuracy 

 of such a sweeping assertion may fairly be called into question, there are 

 undoubtedly respects in which the horse in domestication is very often 

 the victim of his owner's ignorance, indifference, or even mistaken kind- 

 ness, and in no particular is this more strikingly conspicuous than in the 

 ordinary treatment of organs so vitally essential to his usefulness as his 

 feet. No portion of the horse's economy has suffered so many wrongs, 

 or as a natural consequence endured so much uncalled-for suffering, as 

 his feet, and to shoeing a very large proportion of these evils is, beyond 

 all doubt, directly or indirectly referable. 



Unfortunately, under certain conditions, shoeing is an almost una- 

 voidable consequence of the horse's domestication, and, although we 

 may have no wish to uphold the traditional methods, we are driven to 

 the conclusion that an artificial protection of some kind for the horse's 

 foot is very frequently one of the penalties which civilization exacts. 



