STRAINS 77 



Previous to farther animadverfion, it becomes 

 unavoidably neceffary to combat the promul- 

 gated opinion of Osmer, who, in his remarks, 

 ventures an alTertion that *' tendons are un- 

 •* eJaftic bodies," though, in the very fame page 

 (and frequently after), he fays ** the tendon is 

 '' often elongated and ftrained." — How this 

 writer, or his readers, could reconcile fuch pal- 

 pable abfurdity and contradidion, I am at a lofs 

 to conceive ; or how a tendon can be elongatedih2Lt 

 has no elafltcityy I am yet to learn. Nor does the 

 introdudion of this obfervation prove of greater 

 utility than to corroborate the propriety of 

 my former remarks upon the Angularity of 

 AiiciENT practice and modern pui?/icatiom. 



To underftand this fubjecfl: clearly, it is un- 

 avoidably neceffary to be informed not only 

 of the caufes from which fuch complaints 

 proceed, but the parts that conftitute the feat 

 of difeafe itfclf. To acquire which let it be 

 obferved strains are of two forts, the one 

 originating in the ligamentary parts, by which 

 the different joints are preferved in contad; 

 the other by a relaxation of the miifcles, or 

 tendons, vi^hofe purpofes are the dired office 

 of motion. Hence it is that the farrier and 



groom 



