94 
SHORT NOTES ON PROFESSIONAL SUBJECTS. 
Very few horses require any of the crust removing, beyond what is done in 
fitting the shoe ; the more horn there is below the sensitive parts, the less mischief 
nails do, as shown by the following Figs. 5 and 6 :—• 
Fig. 5 . Fig . 6. 
The dotted lines represent the sensitive laminae; by leaving sufficient horn the 
nails are far removed from this extremely delicate membrane. It is not absolutely 
necessary for a nail to penetrate the sensitive laminae to cause mischief, for if the 
nail approaches it, the horn which becomes displaced presses upon the laminae and 
causes considerable pain on a membrane so highly sensitive. 
When the fitting of the shoe is completed, it may be made sufficiently warm to 
make for itself a seating or bed, so as to ensure the foot and the shoe having two 
planes as near as can be obtained ; this can be done without destroying the texture 
of the adjacent horn. The crust which is thus removed, and by the previous opera¬ 
tion of fitting the shoe, is generally found sufficient in working horses to reduce the 
foot to a healthy size. 
The outer wall should under no pretence be rasped, the clinch should be simply 
knocked down, and not let into the crust by making a line with a rasp. Should any 
portion of horn project after the shoe is applied, it must on no account be rasped 
away but left; if this is strictly adhered to the hoof never becomes brittle or splits 
and a shoe rarely if ever lost. 
The sole of the foot should not be pared in the least, nor the frog unless very 
ragged, and the ragged portions likely to collect and retain dirt and moisture, then 
the dead portions only should be cut off; but when a frog is not interfered with but 
allowed to receive a due amount of pressure, it will be found fully developed in a 
short space of time, 
