Page:Horse shoes and horse shoeing.djvu/607

 'The horse thus shod, after the early days succeeding its first application, when it sometimes goes less freely than usual, and appears more sensitive to the asperities of the ground, movies evenly, and with lightness, grace, suppleness, and liveliness, and is more easily managed; all his paces, in a word, indicate that he finds himself more at liberty than with the sub-plantar shoeing.

'When at rest, we observe that he has nearly always his four feet resting on the ground, while other horses have usually a foot resting—no doubt to relieve alternately the dull pain or fatigue they experience in the hoof; neither is this so hot or feverish after journeys.

'Like the Lafosse shoe, although much more efficiently, it prevents slipping. During the frost of the first days in January and February, I have been able to travel with confidence without frost nails or calkins, when the horses of others could not move unless their feet were armed with these appliances so destructive to feet and limbs. I one day travelled along boldly with a mare whose limbs were used-up, but which was shod on my system, alongside a troop of cavalry, the soldiers being forced to dismount and lead their horses by the bridle. In snowy weather, every horse had its feet balled and walked with difficulty, while mine experienced nothing of the kind, and this result has since been observed with farm horses working on heavy clay land, where, during damp weather, they previously had their feet laden with masses of soil several inches thick, from which they could only with difficulty be freed.

'It must be an immense advantage in Paris to be able to prevent horses from slipping, not only during the