Stereoplea, or, The artificial defence of the horse's hoof considered / by Bracy Clark.

  • Clark, Bracy, 1771-1860.
Date:
1817
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Stereoplea, or, The artificial defence of the horse's hoof considered / by Bracy Clark. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by The Royal College of Surgeons of England. The original may be consulted at The Royal College of Surgeons of England.

    6/46 (page 2)
    b in making shoes of various constructions, that had the above property of being removable, till my health became greatly injured by the fatigue of these labours, and I was at last obliged to abandon them for a less perfect plan. In the course ot the above period, I made more than forty, differ- ently planned and contrived, and used many of them in a private way with tolerable satisfaction, but did not think them on the whole fit objects for general adoption with the public, and laid them aside, as I have stated, for a shoe of a less perfect kind, viz. a shoe nailed to the foot, therefore not removable, made of two parts, possessing motion with the foot, not constraining it; this resource, though not exactly what I wished, I preferred to the fatigue of exertions now become severely painful. I however propose, in the course of this tract, to give engravings of some of these, that they may stand recorded; they may also serve as steps to future enquirers in this line of pursuit, who, by availing themselves of them, may arrive at superior excellence It occurred to me, at a very early period of my labours on this object, that a removable shoe of the above description, once fitted to the hoof, might be rendered very durable, or even permanent, by having a second shoe to receive the wear, screwed or rivetted beneath it; that the first expence in making such a shoe would be almost all the expence that would be required, and would be no object in a matter of such con- sequence, as the saving from ruin the foot of so valuable an animal; the second shoe being renewed at pleasure, at per pound of iron or steel. I discovered also, another method of defending the foot upon quite a different principle, which might be useful, in some cases where excessive labour was not required, or where about double or treble the work more than the natural hoof would perform was required. For this purpose, I used a cap of steel hardened to the spring temper to defend the wearing line of the hoof, which extends from the toe or front parts of the foot to the middle of the outside quarter of the hoof; this defence was fastened by a brace and strap, and could be applied without nails, by a purchase on the side of the hoof, and which, as I propose to describe farther on, I shall not here enter into further particulars of. I have sometimes thought, that horses might be usefully divided into classes according to the nature of their work, and be defended accordingly. Without extending farther these general remarks, I will now advert to the proper objects of this treatise, the consideration of the foot, and its