32 EXAMINATION OF HORSES 



you can make out, you will often be at no little loss 

 how to act when there are evidences of treatment. 

 What was said with regard to evidences of a horse 

 having been bled at the jugular vein, might here be 

 repeated. It may be that the horse has really been 

 lame in the shoulder, and the lameness now absent 

 may recur ; or it may be that he has never been lame 

 in the shoulder, and yet has been treated for shoulder 

 lameness. In any case, should the horse pass muster 

 in everything except these marks, by all means let him 

 pass with the whole of that limb (and not the shoulder 

 only) warranted to stand sound for a prescribed time. 



The parts from the point of the shoulder to the elbow 

 are seldom found to require much of our attention at 

 these times, and the elbow joint is remarkably free from 

 ailment at all times ; and, as the parts from the elbow 

 to the "carpus" (knee) are also singularly free from 

 disease, practically we can pass from the point of the 

 shoulder to the knee almost at once. We are, in our 

 plan, examining the front part of the limb first. 



Having come to the knee, we are arrived at an im- 

 portant part— a part much liable to injury, and one 

 which can receive none but the most trivial scratch 

 with impunity. The sight and touch do a good deal 

 for us here, but by no means all. On passing the fingers 

 over the front of the knee, and smoothing the hair, we 

 may feel and see any injury to the skin. Unfortunately, 

 the term "broken knees" is such a vague one that it 

 includes every degree from mere clipping or chipping 



