back.’ Mr. Douglas tells us that he found by careful experiment that light shoes will wear longer than heavy ones. The contract farrier, by putting on heavy ones, is thus, as usual, wrong again; and he cheats himself this time—a very fitting judgment upon him. It is unfortunate that the rest of his mistakes do not equally recoil upon him. If this were the only mistake that he makes, it would prove that he takes no warning by experience, and makes no useful observation, when he incontinently, although in an overreaching way, actually mulets himself! This man will also put in extra nails, and make clips on the shoe to help the nails to keep on the exorbitant weight of iron; and all this means only so much extra mutilation of the hoof.
Horses in England are universally over-shod, as well as over-mutilated in the hoof; although, only last year, the author of the ‘Book of the Horse’ wrote, in a contemporary, ‘The general tendency of the age is to shoe as little as possible.’ This ‘tendency’ is very little apparent when people come to observe every horse they meet (as the writer does); although one notable exception (as there is to every rule) is to be found in the streets of London in the horses belonging to Mr. John Smither, East Smithfield. These horses do not slip about as much upon greasy pavements and asphalt as is the rule with other horses. At the present season, London observers may satisfy themselves on this score. This gentleman is owner of a considerable number of horses, and his cars
