Iviii 



INTRODUCTION. 



purcliaser is apprehensive lest his new Horse should from 

 any cause turn out unserviceable or unequal to that, for 

 the performance of which he has bought him ; the vendor 

 is apprehensive, either lest the animal, in other hands, 

 should not prove that sound and effective servant he con- 

 ceived or represented him to be, or lest some unrepre- 

 sented or concealed fault or defect he is aware the animal 

 possesses may now, in his new master's hands, be brought 

 to light." 



"Soundness, as opposed to actual or decided lameness 

 (or as synonymous with good health), is a state too well 

 understood to need any definition or description ; when 

 we come, however, to draw a line between soundness and 

 lameness in their distinguished form — to mark the point 

 at which one ends and the other begins — we meet a diffi- 

 culty, and this difficulty increases when we find ourselves 

 called on to include, under our denomination of unsound- 

 ness, that which is liliehj or has a tendency to bring forth 

 lameness. It will be requisite, therefore, for us to say, 

 not simply that every lame Horse is unsound, but to add 

 these words, or who has that about him u-hich is likely on 

 work to render him lame. This will, it is true, open the 

 door to difference of opinion and equivocation. There 

 may, as we have seen, spring up two opinions concerning 

 the 2^rescnce even of lameness. There will in more cases 

 be two opinions concerning that which is accounted to 

 be the precursor of lameness, or may have a tendency at 

 some period proximate or remote to produce it ; all which 

 differences are best got rid of by reference to the ablest 

 Veterinary advice. There will be less diversity of opinion 

 among professional men than among others, and the more 

 skilful and respectable the professional persons are, the 

 greater will be the probability of a liappy unison in their 

 views of the case " (a). 

 Conflicting Mr. Godwin, M.E.C.S., Veterinary Surgeon to the 



trsmmdnU ^^^en, makes the following sensible remarks on the 



(«) The Veterinarian, vol. xviii. p. 366. 



