Whatever decision we may reach respecting the Mediaeval custom, more recent records, till within the last few years, afford sufficient testimony of the shoeing of cattle which worked on the farm. The animals were also shod when taken long distances to fairs[1311]. The Sussex tradition is sound on this point, for old drovers still talk of the former usage. Within the last decade the custom of shoeing has been abandoned, at the time when “the labour’d ox” is itself about to disappear. A Sussex farmer told me (1908) that shoeing is unnecessary, save for bullocks working on the “hard road”: if the creature’s feet become tender, it should simply be allowed to rest for a day or two. A second authority puts the matter tersely: “Once begin to shoe, and you have to keep on doing it.” The operation needed some skill. A rope (“girt” or girth) was placed around the neck of the animal, while another cord embraced one fore and one hind leg. Then, by passing the ropes over a beam—evidently by the aid of a pulley block—the beast was thrown on its back. To prevent struggling, a man sat on the bullock’s head and neck. Not unfrequently the long horns would be snapped off by the impact, in such a way that the horn cores and skull were injured. If this were followed by excessive bleeding, the ox had to be slaughtered. Each foot was supplied with two shoes, or, as the Sussex folk term them, “kews,” or “cues”: “You can’t call them shoes, zur; they are like a q,” and the shape of this letter doubtless originated the nickname. The word “cue,” as proved by the English Dialect Dictionary, is common in the Southern and Western counties. Sometimes only the outer toe of each foot was shod, since the exterior edge was believed to get the greatest strain and pressure. The shoes, as we will continue to designate them, are in the form of a rough crescent, or a comma much widened at the head ([Fig. 96] A). The nails look like tiny hammers ([Fig. 96] B). One relic of folk-custom is curious. Before being driven in, each nail was thrust into “a piece of fat pork,” the belief being that this made the nail enter the hoof more easily; moreover, if the “quick” were accidentally pierced, the hurt would be speedily healed. One blacksmith declared that he was glad when the shoeing of oxen was given up: he did “not want to shoe any more of the vicious creatures.” On the contrary, the aged blacksmith of Ditchling, now long past work, averred that he would rather shoe two bullocks than one horse, although each bullock required eight “cues” with five nails in each (40 nails), as against four horseshoes with 28 nails[1312]. But perhaps this worthy, in his retirement, looked back on his bygone labours through the pleasant haze of years, and remembered only the happy occasions.
The Ditchling blacksmith, however, unconsciously had the support of an authority on cattle, Youatt, who, while of opinion that shoeing was a necessary evil, justifiable only because it increased the speed and endurance of the bullock, declared that the task was not difficult. He alludes, adversely, to a contrivance recommended by Bakewell for aiding the blacksmith. This arrangement, the “trevis” (O. French, traversan = a cross-beam), was apparently some kind of modification of the cross-beam described by the Sussex blacksmith. In the Vale of Pewsey, the ox was placed in a kind of rectangular cage made by fixing horizontal bars in four uprights. The animal’s leg having been fastened to one of the posts, “cueing” was an easy matter—at least, so the Pewsey blacksmith considered. Still another method was to throw the animal on his back, tie his legs, and “hold down his horns with a pitchfork.”
Youatt declares that the trevis is dangerous both to the ox and to the smith. What the bullock suffers from is fear, not natural indocility. Therefore prepare the beast gradually for the ordeal. Often handle him, lift his feet, and strike them gently with the hammer. By and by, as he finds that no harm is done, he will most likely submit meekly to the process of real shoeing. Little skill is required on the part of the artisan, but much patience. There is no weakness of particular parts of the hoof, no “corn,” no tenderness of the frog, no contraction to be studied. One has simply to fit the metal to the sole. The shoe of the hind foot, should be thinner, narrower, and lighter than that of the fore foot; it should also be less curved and more pointed[1313].
If we now inquire why the bullock was, little by little, driven from his old position, we may find it partly in the two improvements already mentioned—the drainage of arable lands, and the evolution of the draught horse. Another reason which has been assigned, was the wild condition of the boundary hedges of fields, which, although now usually trimmed and pleached, had been allowed to straggle wastefully and to increase in height. The consequence was that the horns of the cattle often became entangled when the team turned at the headland; where the branches of hedgerow trees hung low, the risk was still greater. The narrow roads and hollow lanes, too, were frequently so overarched with branches and climbing plants that the Craven breed of cattle, whose horns were a yard in length, were in danger of breaking either their horns or their necks[1314]. During great heat, Mr Stephen Blackmore informs me, the oxen would often fall exhausted in the furrow, while the horses laboured on. Always, too, in hot weather, there was anxiety lest the team, being attacked by flies, should become ungovernable, and, dragging the plough over ridge and furrow, dash madly for the nearest thicket or pond, to the dismay and peril of the ploughman. Such are some of the causes which are supposed to have wrought the revolution, but surely these reasons must have been effective long before the actual change came. Another factor, more operative one would think, was the improvement made in the construction of ploughs, which now became lighter and more manageable. Roads, also, received greater attention. Trackways of soft clay, responsive to the cloven hoof, were superseded by metalled roads and rough causeways of limestone, “in all seasons unfriendly to the feet of oxen[1315].” We thus see that it needed a strong set of forces to break the bond of tradition concerning draught oxen. For some decades, it is true, the horse and the ox continued to be allies in farm work, but the partnership was virtually dissolved about the time when the leas were visited by the
“kittle o’ steäm
Huzzin’ an’ maäzin’ the blessed feälds wi’ the Divil’s oän teäm.”
And now the tradition of working oxen has so nearly vanished that, except in Sussex, it is difficult to glean information on the subject. To begin the search for a cow-shoe is almost like setting out to find the golden fleece. Even more difficult would it be to discover, outside a museum, a specimen of the framework, with its set of bells, which was formerly fixed above the yoke. The ox-waggoner of these unromantic times, could we find such a worthy, would tell us that the bells were employed for ornament and for their musical sound: his ancestors, however, would have asserted that the jingling noise kept off witches and persons possessing the “evil eye.”
There is, indeed, a considerable amount of folk-lore respecting the ox, but, before examining this, time will not be misspent if we examine the pedigree of the animal.
Most authorities now recognize three species of ox (Bos) as having inhabited our island in Pleistocene and recent geological times. We will glance at the three species in order. The European bison (Bos priscus) is now found nowhere except in Poland, and need detain us only a moment. This animal had
