85s DADD'S VELERINARY MEDICINE AND SURGERY. 
Binding up the crack is a good practice after firing. With 
wax-end of sufficient length (such as shoemakers use) bind rouna 
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 expend, and thereby 
open wider the crack. 
A bar-shoe is the preferable one for a sand-cracked foot. By 
it, the bearing being taken off that 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- 
ing 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. 8., 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 
touches lightly the sensible laminz, 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 Le 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 raaking a ‘ine with 
