592 
ON PODOMETRIC SHOEING COLD. 
Is such silence, our author asks, to be regarded as a proof that 
such trials have proved favourable, or that the novelty is one which 
deserves to be ranked as an useful addition to our science 1 or, are 
we to conclude that the army veterinary surgeons, discouraged by 
insuccess, have virtually abandoned it, by not caring to give any 
notice whatever of its result I 
In setting his opinions in opposition to the podometric system of 
shoeing, M. Reynal desires they may be tried by observation and 
experience alone. He denies that podometric shoeing came first 
to be known in 1840. Lafosse, father and son, Bourgelat, Gohier, 
Chabert, and indeed all who have been engaged in the practice of 
shoeing, were acquainted with and had practised this method of 
shoeing. Its principles had been developed by M. Renaud and in 
the practical lectures of M. Delafond. From which M. Reynal 
concludes that the author of the asserted new (podometric) shoeing 
lias only generalized principles, and replaced the old measure of 
the straw by a new instrument he calls a podometer. And after 
all that has been vaunted about the system of shoeing cold and 
away from the forge, he is of opinion that the objections to the old 
method have been based upon the ill-treatment horses have received 
when taken to the forge to be shod, and that these have made way 
for the new. 
After having convinced himself, after four years’ trial, that cold 
shoeing generally in use among the horses of a regiment was 
attended with nothing but serious inconvenience, M. Reynal infers 
from a series of observations, — 1st, That the heat of the (heated) 
shoe, when its application to the foot is limited to a reasonable 
time, nowise harms the living parts of the foot; 2dly, That fitting 
the shoe hot, so far from being injurious, is absolutely necessary 
to the solidity and durability of shoeing; 3dly, That the modifica- 
tions the hoof (through shoeing) undergoes in some of its physical 
properties, put it into a more favourable condition to bear shoeing, 
and to resist such external agents as might deteriorate it. 
So that, summing up M. Reynal’s conclusions, they shew : — 
1. That cold shoeing, generally adopted, is attended with more 
inconvenience than advantage, and particularly where it is practised 
by blacksmiths of no more than ordinary power. 
2. That the long-continued practice of it gives false direction to 
the wall at the quarters, hastens the deterioration of broken feet, 
while it renders the hoof, of itself, brittle. 
3. That many of the inconveniences, far from being, as in hot 
shoeing, the result of inattention or ignorance on the part of the 
smith, are inherent in the method itself. 
4. That shoes fitted cold to the foot are not so firmly seated nor 
so enduringly so as shoes fitted hot. 
