82 



CONFORMATION AND ITS DEFECTS 



volume. When unduly small they neither supply a good base of support 

 nor take a sufficient grip of the ground. Many are structurally weak, 

 and all fail to conserve the limbs for want of that breadth and substance 

 necessary to diffuse and disperse the ruinous efiects of concussion. The 

 objection to small feet will be more serious in proportion as the action 

 is high and the hoof is wanting in stoutness and strength. 



Objectionable as are these conditions of excess and deficiency of de- 

 velopment, there are defects of conformation still more inimical to work and 

 wear which require to be noticed in dealing with this region. 



Flat feet are among the worst of this group, for the reason that flat- 

 ness is nearly always associated with weakness of the general structure of 

 the organ. Besides being flat, the feet are usually on the 

 large side. The heels are low, the frog 

 full and fleshy, and the crust thin, loose 

 in texture, and brittle. Feet of this 

 character are commonly found in animals 

 bred and reared on soft fen or marsh- 

 land. They are liable to laminitis, bruis- 

 ing of the sole and frog, and especially 

 predisposed to corns. The pasterns 

 in horses of this class are wanting in 

 substance and usually much inclined. 

 Upright Feet. — Feet so termed are deep in the crust, from the 

 coronet to the ground surface, from heel to toe, and at the same time 

 wanting in forward slope or obliquity. The direction of the pasterns 

 in this formation follows more or less closely that of the feet, as a result 

 of which the weight is directed towards the front of the foot, causing it 

 to fall more immediately on the Ijony columns, and much of the elastic 

 reaction of the tendinous and ligamentous structures behind is lost to 



Fig. 64.— Flat Fout 



Upright Foot 



the liml). 



THE HIND LIMB 



In dealing with this division of the body, it would have been more in 

 accord with anatomical teaching to have commenced with a consideration of 

 the pelvis as forming the upper extremity of the hind-limb, but as we have 

 already dealt with it when speaking of the croup, it only remains to say 

 that although the pelvis is the counterpart of the shoulders, its intimate 

 connection with the spine, and the share it takes in enclosing the viscera, 

 render it permissible to regard it for our present purpose as the posterior 

 part of the trunk. 



