LAMENESS IN HORSES. 
486 
The various and apparently opposite Causes set down 
to the account of contraction by writers on the subject, for the 
most part will, if what I have advanced be based upon fact and 
experience, admit at once of explanation and even of reconcilia- 
tion. The list of causes as given by Blaine is — “neglect of 
paring away the adventitious growth of horn ; the application 
of artificial heat ; the deprivation of natural moisture ; constitu- 
tional liability; the existence of frushes ; the removal of the 
bars, and too great lessening of the frog ; the effects of pressure 
occasioned by long confinement in a state of inactivity, and in 
an erect position ; and, lastly, the contracting effects of shoeing.” 
Of which “list” Youatt approves in the following terms: — “A 
very excellent writer, particularly when treating of the foot of 
the horse, Mr. Blaine, has given us a long and correct list of the 
causes of injurious contraction, and most of them are, fortunately, 
under the control of the owner of the horse.” 
Now, much as I respect the opinions of these two defunct 
eminent writers, I cannot help thinking that both of them have 
evinced deficiency of observation, let their experience have 
amounted to much or little, on the subject before us. I repeat 
it again and again, that, were it not for the (indirect it is true, 
but still) potential influence of the horseshoe, we should have 
to complain but very little of the production of contraction, since 
only under particular circumstances, and rarely even then, are 
any of the causes mentioned of effect in giving rise to it. Con- 
traction is the last thing we apprehend in unshod horses. Nor 
even when horses are kept constantly shod with tips, ab initio, 
do we hear that contraction is among the evils which may then 
befal them. Such being verily the state of the case, I cannot 
help expressing my surprise to read in Youatt’s work such 
passages as — “ The opinion is perfectly erroneous that con- 
traction is the necessary consequence of shoeing.” — “ Shoe- 
ing may be a necessary evil, but it is not the evil some 
speculative persons supposed it to be.” By way of “ plain 
proof” whereof, he states — “ that although there are many 
horses that are ruined or injured by bad shoeing, there are 
others, and they are a numerous class, who suffer not at all from 
good shoeing, and scarcely even from bad.” Coleman said the 
same thing ; — by shoeing property, ab initio , contraction might 
be prevented. And so far as pure contraction is the question, 
there is no doubt truth in this. But it is not the whole truth. 
The majority of cases of contraction are, as we shall by-and-by 
see, cases of mixed contraction, such as are produced under the 
influence of the shoe, and such, I may add, as without the shoe 
we should most certainty, comparatively speaking, hear but 
little complaint about. 
Pure Contraction does not produce Lameness. Cole- 
