The foot of the horse

Front matter

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UNITED STATES OF yifllERICA.

TENDONS AND LIGAMENTS OF THE FORELEG.

Preface

This work will be found to be entirely new, and on a different plan from anything of the kind which has yet been presented. The writers upon the subject of shoeing and the management of horses' feet are very numerous, but an analysis of their writings shows that the work of one is often merely a repetition of that of another. The author proposes to lay down a rule for every practitioner or operator upon the foot of the horse. The cuts and drawings are entirely new, differing from any others that have so far been presented to the public. They are the harvest or fruits of the seeds sown over forty-five years ago.

This work on shoeing will show that from one century to another, no science — either medical or mechanical — has yet arrived at the root of the causes from which result the daily ailments and lamenesses. It will cast a new light before the eyes of the veterinary profession, and prove clearly that, instead of the medical science which men have studied from one generation to another, their works have brought forth no recompense. Had they spent their allotted time in the study of mechanical science in reference to the horse's hoof, no doubt they would have found a specific for each and every ailment centuries ago.

Vi PREFACE.

The following illustrations of improved methods of shoeing horses — whether for the purpose of preventing diseases and lamenesses or for removing or ameliorating those abnormal conditions when they present themselves — are so simple that any one endowed with ordinary intellect may readily perceive from the various drawings, each suitable to its own disease, how accurately he mighi arrive at the precise point and make a correct diagnosis, thereby enabling him to prescribe a specific for each case that presents itself.

The accompanying drawings of various postures will enable the operator to form a correct prognosis, as well as an accurate diagnosis, and without being capable of complying with the latter it will be an utter impossibility to assent to the former.

The following mechanical appliances are composed —

1 . Of any device which may tend to change the bearing or maintain the equilibrium, such as a shoe formed or constructed in such a manner as the case may require.

2. The hoof itself so modified by paring or rasping as to arrive at the required form.

3. Of any appliance for expanding the hoof, so as to symmetrize the foot proper.

4. The surface on which the horse stands constructed as the case may require, having an ascent or descent, to change the pathological conditions or postures into a physiological stature or attitude.

THE FOOT OF THE HORSE.