The daily dispatch. [volume] (Richmond [Va.]) 1850-1884, 1881-07-07
HOrse.ShOeing.
fFrom the American Guest.J
country.


There are some 5000 horses and mules in
Hanover county. Probably 1000 OF this
number are at work on the roads and farms.
Four sets Of shoes at 81 per setare required
for horse that is kept shod, amounting TO
lS8, 900 per annum. This is a considerable
ltaX, and il it can be shown to be useless
fought to be saved. think this can not
only be done, but that the practice is iniu-
rious. The horses foot is composed of a
bundle OF tubes glued together by a
peculiar substance. The tubes carry
the fluids which give life and growth
Ito the part. The foot is f00red
by hard, compact, elastic substance, with.
out sensibility (; il also contracts and eX-
pands, which increases the elasticity and
moderates the force OF every blow. Place
one unshod foot OF horse on smooth
plank covered with paper, and trace its
contour, then the other foot OF the same
horse, shOd, and you will find the eXpan-
sion in the unshod foot of one eighth of an
inch. Watch the animal stamp, even with an
uusbod foot, and you will be convinced OF
the insensibility of that member TO blows.
| To bind the hoof with q strong iron and to
drive nails into il, destroys all expansion, pre-.
vents the free circulation Of healthy blood,
impairs its elasticity, destroys a large num-
Der of the tubes OF which the hoof is made,
and produces disease. Much time and labor
and ingenuity have been expended in try
ing to make a shoe free from objection, but
all patterns have failed, all produce more
or less physical injury, and not one can be
relied upon to prevent slipping on ice or
on smooth pavement. When shoe pre-.
vents slipping, ii is from high, sharp heels,
or rough nails driven into the hoof.
frof,x he >
cut his ankles, cork his hoofs, make
| him stiff and sore, and cause him TO
wound his mate when working double. 1t
| is not at all strange that all the best authori-
ties declare that nine tenths OF the diseases
Of horses proceed from their feet. The life
Of an animal should be five times as long as
it takes to reach maturity. The horse, then,
should reach at least thiIty-fiye years Of age,
and be useful for period Of twenty years.
AS 1t is, he is old at fifteen, and past use at
twenty. This must be owing to the un-
natural manner in which he Is treated. AS
nine tenths Of his diseases and disabilities
arise from his feet, we must look TO that
member when we wish TO restore bin
to usefulness, and il is rather strange that,
instead OF trying to invent proper horse
shoe, we should not conclude to discard it
altogether. Candor compels me to say that
there is another evil which, it seems, like
horse-sboeing, cannot be eradicated: that .
the treatment to which our horses are >.
iected by hOrse-d0ctOrs and grOOms. A
celebrated authority says: "No class OF
servants are entrusted with as much power
as grooms, and they are usually the worst
Informed persons living" Without CON-
mon sense, utterly ignorant OF anatomy,
surgery, and medicine, they use arsenic, an.
timony, nitre; they bleed, blister, cauter.
lie, and cut, and deal with our horses ac.
cording to the popular notions, which are
absurdly outrageous. A horse suddenly
seized with muscular cramps from drink
ing largely 81 cold water on hot day is
treated with turpentiDe until his kidneys
are affected and the secretions from that
organ arrested, as cure.
For number OF years / have not shod
my horses, believing it to be the shoe and
not the road that injured the foot, and
when engaged in the practice OF medicine
used bay mare, which | bought at four
years old, for period OF eight years with.
out shoes. She was driven or rode, NAV
say, almost daily during the hard, dry
weather OF summer and the cold and Ice OF
such winters as those OF 1856 and 1857. |
During this whole period her hoofs
were sound and good. / preferred
Der on the ice, Us much less Stable TO slip !
than shod horse. She was hardy and |
fheathy during that period, and always |
ready 20 do her work. A slight rasping TO |
keep her feet 10 shape was all the care be. |
slowed upon them. A gentleman living |
near me also used unshod horses. He was |
a bold rider, fond OF fox-huEting, and. |
thoSgh a large and heavy man, would per-
form feats OF horsemsnship on his un.
shod horse (eaping fences aud bitches
and gall0ping on ice TO show the sumo.
riority OF bare foot to q shod onel
which bis companions riding shod horses
JARED not initiate. This was j. b. Edwards,
rho, IN company with Robert Pollard,
'rs then clerk Of King William county,
luSted regularly, during fox season, over a
arge extent OF country. Most persons who
ave been much acquainted with horses will
ell yeu OF some old horse which has been
worked or rode for years without shoes, and
whose loofs became harder and harder as be J
ragged bis burden down the road Of life,
onnrming what the scientists now declare,
bat large number OF the diseases OF horses
roceed from their feet, and that tbe shoe =
nj not the road figures the foot.
There is little episode In the history OF .
irginla which shows that the early settlers
"a not shoe their horses. l aIlude TO Gov. a
nor Spotswood's tKans-montane expedi. U
~. His horses becoming lame when tbeyI
aehed the rocky roads, smithy was Inn
oyised mol far from where Fredericksburg u
W stands and the lame horses sbod. This n
neness Eas probably produced by some Ii
Ter cause tut the gentlemen composing b,
J expedition, on their return, Instituted W