AND TRAINING OF THE ENGLISH RACE-HORSE. 231 
making it. We have not room for extracts from it; and there¬ 
fore we pass it over with a recommendation to such of our 
readers to peruse it for themselves as in any way lack such in¬ 
formation ; for, though it cannot, perhaps, strictly speaking, be 
called veterinary , yet is it knowledge of that nature, the posses¬ 
sion of which will always prove highly useful and recommenda¬ 
tory to the medical practitioner. 
Having advanced so far in our review of the literary labours of 
Mr. Darvill, we find we must, in place of pursuing the course he 
has set us, take a leap from Chapter IX to Chapter XXII, pass¬ 
ing by without notice the intermediate chapters (treating on 
“ Training Grounds,” “ Race-courses,” “ Grooms and Boys,” 
“ Dressing Race-horses,” “ Reins,” “ Riding in Exercise and 
Sweats,” “ The Pull and Hustle,” and “ Public and Private 
Training Grooms and Jockeys”) in order to arrive at what more 
concerns us, namely, one that discourses 
“ On the Treatment of Horses’ Feet , and on Shoeing . 
“ The feet of race-horses are mostly strong and small, with a 
deep or high crust. Their heels are also high and strong, and 
their soles concave.” The circumstances of their feet being con¬ 
stantly “ covered up with warm bedding,” and of the horses 
“ resting by day as well as by night,” “ occasion the hoofs to 
contract” in the stable; whereas, “ while in their paddocks, their 
feet are almost constantly moist,” and “ almost always in action,” 
“ exposed to air,” and “ there is a good deal of weight upon 
them;” circumstances which “ keep them expanded.” 
For keeping the hoof “ tough and elastic,” an ointment, “com¬ 
posed of equal parts of tar and mutton suet or lard,” is recommend¬ 
ed by our author: “ to be well rubbed round the hoof twice or 
thrice a week.” 
% 
Mr. D. “coincides with the opinion of Professor Coleman,” 
“ that the frog is intended to receive pressure.” “ Neither racers 
nor hacks have occasion for caulkings to their shoes.” 
“Race-horses are occasionally subject to the navicular disease; 
but there are some among them, such as craving ones, which are 
more liable to become affected with the complaint than light ones, 
in consequence of their having to go not only long lengths in their 
gallops and sweats, but occasionally to sweat three times a fort¬ 
night, and not unfrequently in the height of summer, in the 
months of July and August, when most of our training and 
running-grounds in the south may be said to be very little better 
(in regard to the hardness of their surface) than turnpike roads.” 
“ I think of the number of horses that become progressively lame 
