530 TRANSLATIONS FROM CONTINENTAL JOURNALS. 
tached from the limb after death, it is exposed to the heat of 
the sun. Shoeing only contributes to the contraction, inas¬ 
much as it keeps the hoof further from the ground, and 
thereby prevents the little moisture which might occasionally 
be imbibed; also by the shoe being applied hot, thereby causing 
the evaporation of the natural moisture from the parts, and 
the more so in proportion as the foot is more or less pared. 
In general there is too much paring away of the horn at 
the heels and bars, which last are the principal resistants to 
contraction. The frog, which, like a sponge, absorbs the 
moisture, being also kept from the ground, becomes dry, 
hard, and is unable to act as the elastic cushion to the foot, 
for which it was intended by nature. While, on the con¬ 
trary, by not shortening the toes sufficiently, they thereby 
diminish the antagonism to the contraction of the posterior 
parts of the foot. This is principally the case when the shoe 
is applied during the growth of the parts; the iron, being 
nailed to the inferior surface of the hoof, prevents the gra¬ 
dual, but slow, increase of the size of the foot. This evil is 
greatly increased by the bad fitting of the shoes by unskilful 
smiths. 
The preventive means recommended by the author are— 
loose stalls for young horses and mules, and, when con¬ 
traction has begun, to let them stand on soft clay; wet felt 
to be applied to the feet, or stopping them with cow-dung; 
leather and felt soles under the shoes. 
The remedy the author recommends, when the contraction 
is established, is the application of a sort of dilator, em¬ 
bracing the heels on the inside, and expanded at will by a 
screw, the shoe being provided with two clips on the inside 
of the heels, which fixes the bars. By this application the 
author states that he has made more than fifty cures, but it 
should not be had recourse to except in confirmed cases, in 
which only it can be efficacious. Every one must be aware, 
the author observes, that contraction is not always the con¬ 
sequence of affections in the foot, but that it also arises from 
disease existing which have their seat in other parts of the leg. 
The author lays no claim to the invention of the dilator, 
which he thinks was invented by some blacksmith. 
