FRACTURES. AG5 
irregular tumour, which interferes terribly with their functions, often 
growing so as to prevent the closure of the teeth. This disease is repre- 
sented in fig. 7, as far as the osseous tissue is concerned; but the soft 
erowths, which occupied the central parts of the tumour, have been 
removed by maceration. The symptoms are entirely local, and when a 
large, unwieldy, and irregularly hard swelling on either of the jaws is 
met with, it may safely be set down as belonging to this class of disease. 
No treatment is of any avail except excision, which can rarely be carried 
through without rendering the horse unserviceable for his ordinary duties, 
FRACTURES. 
Bones are not unfrequently broken in the horse ; but as the accident 
generally occurs either during the viqsent exertion of the muscles of the 
limb, or from great external force, it follows that in most cases the 
injury to the soft parts is so great as to forbid the hope of a perfect 
reparation. When, for instance, a canna or pastern bone gives way 
during the shock sustained in coming down on hard ground from a leap, 
either at the moment of the fracture or before the horse can be stopped, 
the upper end pierces the skin, and also tears or bruises the tendons which 
alone connect it to the part below. In surgical language, the fracture is 
a compound one; and from the great tendency to contraction of the 
muscles, the difficulty of bringing the disunited ends into apposition (or 
setting them) is immense. Moreover, the horse is very unmanageable 
when an attempt is made to confine him, and the means which are 
adopted to keep the fracture set must therefore be very complete as com- 
pared with those which will serve for the restoration of the human being 
who has sustained a similar accident. Hence, unless the animal is wanted 
for stud purposes alone, or unless the fracture is a simple one, with little 
displacement, it will seldom be worth the attempt to procure the union of 
a broken bone in the horse. Many cases are on record in which after a 
fracture of a canna or pastern bone a complete cure has been effected, 
but they must be considered as exceptional, and not as affording us much 
encouragement, 
THE SYMPTOMS OF SIMPLE FRACTURE are a greater or less degree of 
deformity of the limb, swelling, pain on motion, and a peculiar grating or 
jarring which is felt rather than heard, and which has received the name 
of “crepitus.” The last symptom can only be made out when the broken 
ends of the bone can be brought together; but when this is impossible, 
the alteration of form is in itself sufficient to lead to a detection of the 
nature of the accident. In fractures of the head and spine there is no 
crepitus felt, and the effect upon the brain and spinal cord of pressure 
will be often the sole means of coming to a correct diagnosis. Fractures 
of the pelvis are very difficult to make out, unless the ala of the ilium is 
broken off, which is a common accident, for here the unnatural flatness of 
the hip, showing itself without any great difficulty of moving the hind 
leg of that side, plainly marks that there is no dislocation, and that the 
case can only be one of fracture. It is always the result of a blow, 
either when the horse is cast in a stall or in passing through a narrow 
door-way, or from a similar cause; and there will therefore be some 
swelling of the soft parts which will interfere with the examination 
at the time, but as nothing can be done to restore the broken portion 
to its place, and as there is no doubt about the diagnosis from dislo- 
eation, this is of little consequence. Fractures of the ribs cannot ba 
Hd 
