THE NEW POCKET FARRIER. 23 



or with feet turned in or out, for a horse of this make 

 never can be sure footed, and he moves ugly. 



SPLINTS. 



This may be looked upon as a disorder of the fore- 

 legs, though occurring on the hind ones at times. 



Look down his legs to his pasterns, and if you find 

 them clean, lean, flat, sinewy, and the invvard bouglit 

 of his knee without seams, or hair broken, it shows a 

 good shape and soundness ; but if on the inside of the 

 leg you find hard knots, they are splints, of which there 

 are three sorts. The simple splint, which appears with- 

 in the leg under the knee, remote from the great nerve 

 and the joint of the knee, ought not to hinder a man 

 from buying a good horse, for it gives him no pain, is 

 only disagreeable to the sight, and goes away in time of 

 itself All the three sorts of splints are known by the 

 same rule ; for whenever you see a tumour upon the flat 

 of the leg, whether within or without, if it be under the 

 knee, and appears hard to the touch, it is a splint ; and 

 when it is situated as above described, it signifies no- 

 thing ; but when it comes upon the joint of the knee, 

 without any interval, it loses the name of splint, and 

 may be called a fusee ; it then, as one may easily con- 

 ceive, makes the leg of a horse stifle, and hinders him 

 from bending his knee ; consequently it obliges him to 

 stumble, and even fall, and after a violent exercise 

 makes him lame. Rest alone cures the lameness, but 

 not the fusee. 



The third kind of splint, whether within or without, 

 is when you feel it between the nerve and the bone, and 

 sometimes even at the end of the nerve ; this is called a 

 nervous splint, and is the worst of all the kinds ; besides 



