The management and treatment of the horse in the stable, field, and ...

In the Stable, Field, and on the Road. 125
half worn away before they were termed worn out. Nor
was this all ; the horse did not slip half as much with
the narrow shoe, and it entirely altered the horse's
action. With the heavy shoe, he drove his feet along
the road ; with the light ones, he lifted his feet free
from the ground, and put them down evenly and firmly.
The author has had many cart horses shod for farm
purposes, and found that if a horse with a foot 6i in.
across was shod with shoes weighing 5 lb. the set of four
shoes, they would last as long as any shoe ought to
be kept on, and in many instances Avhere the horses
have been working on the land they would be good
enough to remove after a month's work. This is proof
that heavy shoes are more expensive than the narrow-
web, light shoe, and it is false economy to load horses'
feet with iron. The carriage horse requires for its work
a different kind of shoe, yet whether the horse is shod
for cart, carriage, or hacking, the one principle should
rule all, viz., lightness of shoe, with true, even bearing
upon the wall of the foot ;
as few nails as possible should
be used, and each shoe made to fit the foot, not the foot
to fit the shoe. Upwards of forty kinds of shoes have
been made from time to time, each possessing some real
or imaginary advantage, many of them being good, and
one in particular, called the " Goodenough," which is
good enough to lame half the horses with its ponderous
weight and softness of metal. Another shoe has been
before the public from time to time during the last
twenty years, named the"Charlier," after Mons. Charlier,
the inventor of that system of shoeing. It has many
advantages over the old-fashioned shoe, but it again has