902 STRUCTURE AND PHYSIOLOGY OF THE HORSE'S FOOT. 
the manner that I see many of my friends allow their farriers 
to do. The question is not what feet will bear it, but what 
feet will not ; if the knife be kept from the sole and frog for 
a few weeks, an unseated shoe may then be fitted on the foot 
hot, so that the whole width of the shoe (whether cart-horse 
or pony) bears equally and levelly on the sole as the wall, 
that is if the sole be sufficiently developed ; but if not, the 
wall is not to be injudiciously lowered for the purpose of 
making it all level. 
Under this system of shoeing there is no danger of inflict- 
ing pain, brusing the sole, or producing suppuration from 
pressure, as is the case under the paring system. If 
Mr. Greaves doubts the correctness of the above state- 
ments, and will come to Bath to see the plan carried out 
practically, I hope to convince him that I am right. In 
acute cases of* laminitis, when the disease is not arrested, 
separation of the horny from the sensitive laminse takes place 
in consequence of suspension of nutrition, or of the ordinary 
exudation of non-fibrous horn cells from the sensitive 
laminae, and not, as is generally supposed, from the effects of 
effusion producing a mechanical separation. The amount of 
separation or divergence of the coffin bone from the wall will 
mainly depend upon the strength of the horny sole to bear 
the increased weight imposed upon it by the coffin bone after 
it has lost its attachments with the horny laminae. If the 
sole is thin from having been pared, there is a danger of the 
toe of the coffin bone softening and protruding through it ; 
in that case it will become nearly upright, leaving a large 
space between it and the wall. The sensitive lamina will then 
protect itself by throwing out a thick covering of non-fibrous 
horn, but the entire hollow space will not be filled up. The 
ultimate appearance of the feet will much depend upon the 
toes being kept very short, otherwise they will become pithy 
from an accumulation of non-fibrous horn. Disease may 
consist in an alteration in the rate at which a tissue lives and 
grows. If textures which, in the healthy state, grow very 
slowly, appropriate nutriment with undue rapidity and in 
unusual quantity, disease results. As an illustration see how 
thick (hypertrophied) a certain portion of the wall of a 
horse's foot often becomes after the coronet has received an 
injury sufficient to produce chronic mechanical congestion of 
the vessels. And, in like manner, if the rate at which 
nutrition goes on be reduced much below the normal 
standard, the morbid state is developed. As an illustration 
in a mild form take seedy foot, and a case of acute laminitis 
unsuccessfully treated as a more severe example. In very 
