ON SHOEING HORSES THAT CUT. 
113 
rest. Should he prove straight made, and appear to cut from 
weakness, or from going upon dry hard roads, it is commonly the 
branch of the shoe, which is in fault. The same thing may happen 
where the outer quarter of the foot is too low, either naturally so, 
or the effect of bad shoeing. Horses that turn their toes out¬ 
ward, cut with the heel of the shoe, w 7 hile those that point the 
toe inward,* cut with the front. To determine the precise place 
which strikes the other limb, the foot may be covered with dirt 
or some coloured greasy application, before the animal is put into 
action, which will, in course, afterwards speedily become rubbed 
off at the place which does the mischief. 
3. The causes of cutting are numerous ; and by them it is 
principally that the remedy must be determined. 
Shoeing cannot be considered to be the only remedy : in some 
cases it is but an auxiliary to other means, and it is from having 
placed more reliance upon it than it is entitled to, that we have 
occasionally augmented the malady we intended to remove. 
Young horses, w r ell made, and perfectly straight upon their 
legs, unused to labour, or during or recently after some indisposi¬ 
tion, soon in travelling become weary and tired, and then begin 
to hit their legs together : such require nothing more than re¬ 
pose, and restoration of health and condition. Shoeing may be 
brought in to our aid on some such occasions as these; but in 
general it is a bad plan to alter the position of the limbs of young 
horses by thick or thin sided shoes, or any other means. Dealers 
who travel such horses prefer boots , and do so w r ith much reason. 
Indolent, or old and battered horses, or such as are weak in 
their loins, or unsteady in their gait, prove difficult subjects to 
prevent from cutting. The veritable cause of the evil being, in 
most of these cases, out of our reach, shoeing becomes our only 
resource, and but too often a fruitless one. However, we shall 
occasionally succeed by preserving the inner quarter of the hoof 
higher than the external; and putting on a shoe the inner branch 
of which is thicker than the outer, straight and short, and has 
only one, or at most two, nail-holes. Or, it may so turn out that 
the very opposite method of shoeing may be the advantageous 
one. 
For horses that cut in consequence of the naturally defective 
make or position of their limbs, we have naught else to do but 
to endeavour to rectify this deviation; in which attempts we must 
bear in mind what Bourgelat tells us, in his Essay on Shoeing, 
viz. “ That no veterinarian will ever set about to rectify de¬ 
formity of limb, unless he can effect it w ithout any disparage¬ 
ment to the hoof, the conservation ami reparation of which part 
must always be his primary object and end : so that, if he cannot 
