74 



QlS every one knows, is always more difficult to re- 

 move than the original disorder. Time is required 

 for the injured parts to recover their former posture 

 and strength, if that event ever arrive. Firing may 

 be employed after a while, but is very often resorted 

 to prematurely, before the tendons and ligaments have 

 recovered their position, or absorption has reduced 

 the muscular parts to their former size, and restored 

 their action. When three, or four, or five months of 

 moderate labor give reason for believing that these 

 events have taken place, firing is likely to prove 

 highly serviceable by bracing the whole together in a 

 tight skin, much resembling and greatly excelling the 

 long bandage prescribed, with o mbrocation No. 2, 

 under this head. The reader of discernment will 

 pilease to note, that if the said artificial bracing be 

 found to lessen the lameness in that early stage of 

 the disorder, no less will the bracing of the natural 

 skin by firing be t^ound beneficial when healthy action 

 is restored^ but not perhaps the former strength. 



DISEASES OF THE FOOT. 



When these cannot be traced distinctly to any spe- 

 cific cause, they are fairly attributable to aliment of 

 the whole system dropping in the legs, and *' fever in 

 the feet" decidedly so, in my opinion, when both are 

 so afflicted. Therefore it was that I noticed this dis- 

 ease along with " strain of the tendons,'' to which 1 

 attribute its origin, as- much as to other causes of gen- 

 eral heat of the foot. Indeed the whole structure of 

 the foot of the horse is so peculiarly curious that it 

 almost deserves a separate study, but we must always 

 keep in mind, whilst considering its ailments, that the 

 great irritation kept up by its extreme action is readi- 

 ly communicable from the one to the other, so that 

 we cannot intelligibly separate the leg from the foot, 

 when speaking of the ailments of either, notwith- 

 standing I have thought proper to begin this chapter 

 with the disorders that aie situated higher up, and 

 mean to close it with such as only make their ap^ 

 pegirance below. 



