Page:Horse shoes and horse shoeing.djvu/633

 hunting-field. It is scarcely necessary to say that none of these articles gave evidence of the most trifling acquaintance with the subject of horse-shoeing, and many of them appeared to be influenced solely by the special exigencies of an embryo horse-shoe company, destined to invest money and make fortunes out of one of the most pretentious inventions perhaps ever introduced to the notice of the British public. No horseman, nor yet any competent man of science whose opinion is worth having, has yet ventured, so far as I am aware, to commend it in this country; and all the proper experiments hitherto made with it have, I believe, turned out unsatisfactory, or complete failures. As might have been anticipated, it has proved a most injurious method of shoeing; the percentage of crippled horses has been very great, and far beyond that attending the ordinary improper mode of shoeing; the number of shoes cast and lost has been far above the usual average, and horses have cut, stumbled, tumbled, and limped from corns, to my certain knowledge, quite as much, if not more, than with the worst application of the old system. This appears to be acknowledged so far, as the 'only humane method' now tolerates hot fitting apparently to any extent, and also sanctions the employment of calkins at the extremities of the heels, with other modifications, which leave one in doubt how much of the American invention will remain after a few months' longer trial in England. Where it has now and again succeeded in gaining a testimonial, has no doubt been largely due either to these modifications, or to circumstances in which any other ordinary shoe would have been equally successful.