Page:Horses and roads.djvu/52

 36 secretions of the bottom of the crust into a boiling state, and boiling means simply their entire decomposition; so, therefore, he actually kills the foundation on which a horse is built, and it is only the dead part that he has to cut away again (as regards the crust or wall) on the next occasion that he operates upon him. This burning-in business is, therefore, another cause of seedy-toe, false quarter, and sandcrack.

The opinion of Mr. Douglas is well worth reporting here. He says: ‘The fitting of the shoe can always be done better, in my opinion, when the iron is cold, than when hot. Heating the shoe is the quicker way, but it is also the most barbarous one. The mischief done at times, by this custom, was exemplified in the case of Mr. Bevan’s trotting-horse Hue and Cry, which lost both its fore-feet through the shoes having been fitted red hot; and many animals, both before and since, have suffered like misfortunes from the same cause.’

In Spain it is the custom to shoe cold, and not one ‘herrador’ in a hundred has a forge or a pair of bellows on his premises. They even manufacture the shoes without the aid of fire; but it is true that Spanish iron, being primarily manufactured with wood charcoal, is particularly pure, soft, and ductile. The Spanish ’herrador’ or shoeing-smith only—for he does nothing else in the shape of iron forging—does not use the drawing knife (although, of course, the veterinary surgeon does), and he never touches or pares anything but the wall, which he pares down