When the animal is lame and the existence of seedy-toe is surmised, or when the cause of the lameness is altogether obscure, a little information may perhaps be gathered from noting the wear of the shoe. If the animal has been going lame for any length of time as a result of disease in the sensitive laminæ, then the shoe will be greatly thinned at the heels, and the toe but little worn. _Treatment_.--As with diseased structures elsewhere, the most rational treatment, when possible, is that of excision. The entire portion of the wall forming the anterior boundary of the cavity is thinned down with the rasp and afterwards removed with the knife, wholly exposing the hypertrophied, but usually soft layer of horn covering the sensitive structures. These hypertrophied portions are also removed, and every particle of the dust-like detritus cleaned away. After-treatment consists in dressing the parts with a good hoof ointment, protecting them, if necessary, with a pad of tow and a stout bandage. It may be that the removal of a large portion of the wall may for some time throw the animal out of work. Acting on Colonel Fred Smith's suggestion, this may be avoided by having made a thin plate of sheet-iron, slightly larger in circumference than the portion of horn removed, and shaped to follow the contour of the foot. This made, it is sunk flush with the wall by hot-fitting it, and kept in position by several small steel screws fixed into the sound horn, just as in the treatment for sand-crack (see p. 174). This will serve the useful purpose of maintaining in position any dressing that may be thought necessary, of acting as a support to the horn left on each side of the portion removed, and of keeping the exposed structures free from dirt and grit. Practical points to be remembered in fitting plates of this description to the feet are: The plate must never quite reach the shoe, or it will participate in the concussion of progression, and so loosen the screws that hold it in place. For the same reason, that portion of the sole adjoining the piece of horn removed must have its bearing on the shoe relieved. The screws holding the plate should be oiled to prevent rusting, and should take an oblique direction in order to obtain as great a hold as possible on the wall.