198 MR. RODWAY IN DEFENCE OF IIIS PATENT SHOE. 
vember last, to public ridicule? I fear not to be condemned by 
such a writer. I will first answer a few assertions in the November 
number, where the writer states my shoe does not give the hold 
or grasp upon the ground I described, because there is no such 
concavity in the horse’s foot as in my shoe, and that there are 
shoes (he evidently prefers) which “ resemble, as near as shoes 
can do, Nature’s tread itself.” The ground surface of the horse’s 
foot may certainly, as he most curiously describes it, resemble 
“ a sort of inverted oyster-shell.” Why did he not also ask if 
there is such a broad, flat, polished surface, as the common shoe, 
sometimes with or without calkins two inches long, to be found 
in the natural foot? or, why does he not explain, if we are to 
copy the natural form of the foot (which, of course, must be by 
forming an iron shoe the fac-simile of the “ oyster-shell”), how 
many horses could wear such a shoe one day without being lame? 
That would be a rather inconvenient “ Nature’s tread itself.” W ill 
he not allow that if by art, for certain purposes, we are called 
upon to violate natural principles, we are justified also to provide 
by art a remedy ? Not to name the criticism on frog-pressure (con- 
trary to Coleman and most other veterinarians of talent), I would 
simply state, the part which “ bangs Banagher” is the unwar- 
ranted misquotation of my prospectus. Will the writer again 
tell me I have ever stated in that prospectus that “frog-pressure 
will give double work, disease to the animals, and death to the 
rider”? Or does he not know my statements were the very 
reverse ? The quotation from the “ worthy Baronet ” savours 
much like using him as a cat’s-paw. Pray, who, till now, ever 
heard of a concave surface, open at both ends, causing suction 1 
My shoe also, we were informed, could not be “ steeled afresh.” 
Allow me to ask if he has now found that it can ? and if he 
ought not to have known that at the time ? 
I come now to the article in this month’s number of The 
Veterinarian. The writer may well speak of shelves and 
museums ; if, indeed, a man of talent he can be, such, most 
assuredly, must have been his abode for the last nine months — 
or can it be possible he could have known the shoe that length 
of time, had every opportunity of testing it in his own forge (if 
forge he has), properly or improperly made or applied, good or 
bad material used — that he could have written a very long 
criticism in November last, saying most involuntarily more in 
favour than against my shoe ; and only now informs us he has 
had “ time and opportunity to give the shoe a trial” ? Let 
me ask thinking men, what can be more in its favour than for a 
man (who, perhaps, wishes to be considered talented) to have 
such opportunities, such dispositions, and to be able to say so 
