[Illustration: _To face Page 265. Vol. 2ᵈ._ DEMONSTRATIVE SHOEING.]
That this may be done with a more comprehensive and general effect, divested of SCIENTIFIC disquisition, or ANATOMICAL ambiguity, a PLATE is annexed; which, with very little explanatory matter, will afford the most perfect and satisfactory elucidation. A is the representation of a sound, firm, well-formed HOOF, in a slate of unembellished nature: here is evidently no devastation required—no paring off at the heel—no slicing off from the sole—no cutting-knife at the toe; nor does it, with an eye of the strictest judgment and circumspection, seem to claim or solicit from the art of man, any other assistance, than protection against the injury it must inevitably sustain from harder bodies, when brought into use by constant collision. That this fair and candid investigation may be the less liable to miscontruction, and that cynical misrepresentation, or envious opposition, may not (even in the weakest minds) warp the effect of truth, let it be observed, that the circular line marked 1 is the line of articulation, or, in other words, the distinct line of separation; around which is the _wall_ or _crust_ of the HOOF, (in itself insensible,) where the bearing only should be, and where the figure 5 of E will be found accurately formed for its reception.
That part of the foot extending from the line of separation on one side, to the corresponding line of separation on the other, having the FROG in the center, and marked 2 on each side, is called the _outer sole_, covering a membranous mass, or substance, called the _inner sole_, which is of exquisite sensibility, requiring PROTECTION without _pressure_ upon the external part; which it will be seen (by referring to the PLATE) is sufficiently afforded by the concave formation at Fig. 6 of letter E, which, upon the accurate inspection of the best informed and most experienced investigators, must be admitted a shoe of the first perfection for the promotion of every good, and the prevention of every ill.
Having thus produced both _foot_ and _shoe_, as unsullied representations of NATURE and ART, and adapted the _make_ of _one_ to the _formation_ of the other, with a consistency no man of common comprehension will presume to dispute, we proceed to an impartial examination of the letter B, which represents the mode of SHOEING adopted, and some time persevered in, at a place of veterinary celebrity, upon the discontinuance of the very _short-lived_ concave shoe.