LAMENESS IN THE FEET OF HORSES. 
55 
;wo kinds is called for. To detect the existence of this insi¬ 
dious disease during life in its incipient state, all the tact, talent, 
md discrimination of the experienced practitioner are in requi¬ 
sition; for there are many apparently fine open-looking teet 
iffected with this complaint, which in reality are treacherous teet, 
md conceal from the eye of a common obseiver a lurking evi , 
which is generally antecedent to the navicular disease: this is 
the occult partial contraction or pressure, the precise seat of 
which I shall presently point out. 
I propose, first, to show what I conceive to be the primary 
and chief causes of contraction ; and, secondly, attempt to account 
for these instances of contraction, as being unaccompanied with 
lameness. 
Notwithstanding the conflicting opinions of our eminent vete¬ 
rinary writers as to the causes of contraction, all seem agieed in 
the fact, that contraction of the hoof is more or less apparent m 
most horses which have been accustomed to be shod ; that it often 
happens long before they have attained their highest value for 
work, and not unfrequently before they are five years old. On 
taking up the foot of an aged horse, we rather look for it as a 
matter of course j but yet it cannot be denied, that a large pio 
portion of these horses are perfectly free from lameness in the 
heart of labour. . 
In contrasting the feet of our horses (as enduring a state ot 
bondage) with those left to nature, I am convinced that the length¬ 
ened toe, so often the accumulation of from four to six weeks' 
growth of hoof, is a very serious mischief, and a greater violation 
of Nature’s laws than the common shoe or inflexible ring of iron 
affixed to the foot with nails, which, according to Mr. Bracey Clark, 
is the only bane. I am led to this conclusion fiom observing that 
the unshod foot in a state of nature is never subjected to this 
restraint, as the daily wear keeps pace with the growth, and the 
heels widen in proportion as the toe is shortened, and vice versa. 
The next deviation from nature, and which I conceive to be the 
harbinger of the evil, is the passive state to which the feet ot 
horses are submitted by the usual mode of tying the animals to a 
post in a stall, which, even in a well-regulated stable, is fiequently 
from twenty-one to twenty-three hours out of the twenty-foui. 
This, however, is not the worst of it, it being not unusual for a 
horse to stand in his stall two or three days togethei, when not 
required to work. 
If we calculate these vacant hours, and compare them with the 
very few r that a horse in pasture is in a quiescent state (lie being 
always in quest of the best herbage), we need not lie surprised at 
finding, by the end of a year, that certain important parts of the 
