OPINIONS RESPECTING ROARING. 63 
dition, with a fine sleek coat, but, when eaten immoderately, I have 
seen it attended by very serious results. 
This brings a circumstance to my recollection that happened to 
some gentlemen after a hard day with the late Dowager Marchion¬ 
ess of Salisbury’s hounds. Being anxious to obtain some refresh¬ 
ment for their horses, they stopped at a farm-house, and, as no oat¬ 
meal could be procured, they substituted flour, and suffered their 
horses to drink copiously of flour-gruel. On their return home every 
horse was affected, and some to a considerable extent, with spasms 
of the stomach and bowels, exhibiting symptoms resembling those 
which I have noticed after eating a quantity of wheat. 
Wheat-straw is used advantageously for slow-working horses, 
where distention of the bowels is of very little importance, by cut¬ 
ting up one-fourth, or even a third, with rich clover for chaff, and 
giving nothing in the rack. To this I have been a frequent wit¬ 
ness. Where horses are eating half a bushel of oats and beans 
daily, a mixture of straw in this way I consider conducive to a more 
healthy digestive process. How far it might be used for hunters 
or race-horses is doubtful, as with them a diet that contains the 
largest portion of nutriment in a small compass is desirable. It 
might be worth a trial. 
Nimrod also feels naturally interested upon the subject of shoeing, 
and has made some remarks on the different systems of French and 
English shoeing, as operating to produce the comparative different 
extent of lameness which is represented to exist between the horses 
of the two countries. 
It must be admitted that the art of shoeing has greatly improved 
in this country; and, if a comparison could be made between the 
extent of lameness existing now and forty years back from the 
effects of shoeing, the balance in favour of the present system 
would be very considerable. Various causes, however, not altoge¬ 
ther connected with shoeing, combine to produce lameness in the 
feet of horses in this country; but, as far as the art of shoeing is 
concerned, we are most likely to improve by selecting such methods 
as are best adapted to the action of the foot. 
Among the various improvements in general practice are tlie 
seated shoe, the outward bevel of the heels and quarters, the one¬ 
sided nailing, the leather sole, and the French method of nailing to 
a certain extent. Added to these, so far as my experience goes, 
and not much inferior in practical advantages to either of the for¬ 
mer, is that remarkable feature in the French shoe, the bevelled or 
raised toe, so particularly described by Mr. Goodwin. The bevel 
should not be simply at the toe, as the shoe naturally wears, but 
should commence from the anterior part of the quarters, increasing 
gradually to the too : it tends to give the foot a better ground ]io- 
