POSITION AND STRUCTURE OF HORSE 15 



limb-bones are exhibited in the Natural History- 

 branch of the British Museum. 



The figure of the bones of the feet of an extinct 

 three-toed horse is placed alongside that of the 

 cannon-bones of the shire horse in order to show 

 how the splint-bones and rudimentary toe-bones 

 of the latter correspond with the same bones in 

 a more fully developed condition in the former. 



So far as can be ascertained, the splint-bones 

 of the horse and its existing relatives are of no use 

 to their owners, although there is just a possibility 

 that they may be of some slight service in mitigat- 

 ing shock. On the other hand, in domesticated 

 horses they are frequently harmful, since, through 

 inflammation and subsequent exostosis, they give 

 rise to the disease known as splint. 



In this connection it is interestinor to note that 

 a few years ago Professor La V'an de Pas, of the 

 Agricultural and Veterinary Institute of Buenos 

 Aires, published an account ^ of a prevalent type 

 of degeneration in the splint-bones of Argentine 

 horses. In 1904 the author received the left hind 

 cannon-bone of a horse in which the outer splint- 

 bone was only half the normal length, its lower 

 portion being replaced by ligamentous tissue. The 

 other cannon-bones of this horse were not forth- 

 coming, but in the course of the next few years 

 the author had the opportunity of examining a 



^ Anales de Mus. Nacional de Buenos Aires, ser. 3, vol. x. 



