WORKING UP HORSES. It is a common practice of large proprietors, engaged on railroad or city work, to buy up horses with unsound feet, unfitted for speed or gentle service, and use them up, as old clothes are put through a shoddy-mill for what wool there is left in them. This cruel policy, under an intelligent system of shoeing, would be impossible, because the vast aggregate of foot diseases would be so abated that horses, sound in general health but creeping upon disabled hoofs, could not be found in droves, as at present, and the speculator in equine misfortune would better serve his selfishness by buying young horses and keeping them sound by a natural system of shoeing. STUMBLING HORSES. This annoyance is frequently caused by undue use of the toe, when the heel is lame and sore from contraction and corns. When the horse has the frog well on the ground and uses his heel without shrinking he is not apt to stumble. TO INCREASE COMFORT. In dry weather, or when a horse with a hard, lifeless hoof is shod with the Goodenough shoe, and shrinks from the unaccustomed pressure of the frog on the ground, nothing is so grateful to his feet as cold water. The hose turned on them is a delicious bath; or if he can stand for an hour in a wet place, or in a running brook, he will get infinite comfort from it. We have sometimes rapidly assisted the cure of contraction, in the city, by manufacturing a country brook-bottom in this simple way: Put half a bushel of pebbles into a stout tub, with or without some sand, let them cover the bottom to the depth of two or three inches, pour on water and you have a good imitation of a mountain brook. Put the horse's forefeet into this, and let him bear his weight upon the frog. The first time he will grow uneasy after a few minutes, but when his frog becomes natural in its function he will be glad to stand there all day. Do not carry this treatment to excess. Moderation is the most satisfactory course in all things. Abjure utterly all oils and greasy hoof dressings, they are pernicious recommendations of unreasoning grooms. They fill the pores of the wall, and injure in every way. Nature will find oil, if you will allow circulation and secretion, through the action of the frog. "Stuffing the feet," is another wretched, groom's device. A horse has a dry, feverish hoof from contraction, so his hollow sole, denuded of its frog, is "stuffed" with heating oil-meal, or nasty droppings of cows. When this sort of thing is proposed, remember _Punch's_ advice to those about to be married, "Don't do it." CHAPTER VIII. ECONOMY OF THE GOODENOUGH SHOE.