AS TO SOUNDNESS. 41 
LECTURE VI. 
The Fore Foot—Only a Part of a Whole—Its Relation to the Fore 
Leg—When the Horse is Awake—When Asleep—Not so much 
Weight on it when Awake as when the Horse Sleeps Standing 
—The Fore Legs have Efficient Mainstays, except at the 
Navicular Joint—The Navicular Joint very Lefective—The 
Relation between the Phalanges and the Column of Bones 
above—Importance of the Line of the Coronary Band being 
always Noted—Its Tendency to become Horizontal—Long 
Pasterns, Low Heels, and Long T'oes—A Good Foot and 
Pastern—A Boxy Foot—Shoeing Blamed for every Ailment 
of the Foot—Shoe Inventions—The Charlier Shoe. 
GENTLEMEN, — We have now come to the most im- 
portant part of the examination, namely, the fore foot. 
Although there are no end of treatises on this subject, 
I shall be obliged to describe the mechanism exhibited 
here, because authors take a view of the subject which 
I consider to be radically wrong—all seeming alike to 
regard the horse’s foot as a thing fer se and not, as 
really is the case, as only a part of a whole. You cannot 
understand numerous causes of the diseases of the foot 
by looking upon it as a whole. Of course you may say 
that it is only a part of the body technically, but, prac- 
