proceed. By joining his evidence to that of the Boston oculist, whose special study, reflection, and acumen had enabled him to detect a cause concealed under a lady’s flounces, it may be assumed that many puzzling infirmities in the horse may have their source in shoeing. The experiment which would prove this would be interesting, humane, inexpensive, and devoid of all risk. There is nothing in the shape of vivisection in anywise involved in it, and, indeed, there is no valid reason why it should not be made, as, in fact, it has been made, and, if we say nothing of the help which it may give us in accounting for occult infirmities, it has been found to succeed; and it will be so found again.
Mayhew says: ‘The various aspects which disease can assume, of course, are multiform, and unfortunately these, when exhibited by the horse, are all exposed to the arbitrary conclusions of prejudice.’ ‘The diseases of the horse are not yet thoroughly understood.’ Although an advocate of the use of tips, he did not go to the length of advising the entire abolition of iron, which he regarded as a ‘necessary evil.’ After saying that ‘seedy toe had been much thought about, and the fancy somewhat racked to account for its origin,’ he theorised on the subject until he persuaded himself that it was caused by a debilitated and diseased state of the constitution, and prescribed entire rest in the stable (not in the field), with a liberal diet, until a cure was effected. How could he possibly have left out of account the true cause, which was staring him in
