212 HORSE, SWINE AND POULTRY DISEASES 



means dropping or settling on the right, and vice versa. We empha- 

 size this statement and insist upon it, the more from the frequency 

 of the instances of error which have come under our notice, in which 

 parties have insisted upon their view that the leg which is the seat of 

 the lameness is that upon which he drops, and which the animal is 

 usually supposed to favor. 



HOW TO DETECT THE SEAT OP LAMENESS. 



Properly appreciating the remarks which have preceded, but 

 little remains to be done in order to reach an answer to the question 

 as to which side of the animal the lameness is seated, except to ex- 

 amine the patient while in action. We have already stated our rea- 

 sons for preferring the movement of trotting for this purpose. In 

 conducting such an examination the animal should be unblanketed, 

 and held by a plain halter in the hands of a man who knows how to 

 manage his paces, and the trial should always be made over a firm, 

 hard road whenever such is available. He is to be examined from 

 various positions from before, from behind, and from each side. 

 Watching him as he approaches, as he passes by, and as he recedes, 

 the observer should carefully study that important action which we 

 tave spoken of as the dropping of the body upon one extremity or 

 the other, and this can readily be detected by attending closely to 

 the motions of the head and of the hip. The head drops on the same 

 side on which the mass of the body will fall, dropping toward the 

 right when the lameness is in the left fore leg, and the hip dropping 

 in posterior lameness, also on the sound leg, the reversal of the con- 

 ditions, of course, producing reversed effects. In other words, when 

 the animal in trotting exhibits signs of irregularity of action, or 

 lameness, and this irregularity is accompanied by dropping or nod- 

 ding the head, or depressing the hip on the right side of the body, at 

 the time the feet of the right side strike the ground, the horse is 

 lame on the left side. If the dropping and nodding are on the near 

 side the lameness is on the off side. 



But in a majority of cases the answer to the first question re- 

 lating to the lameness of a horse is, after all, not a very difficult task. 

 There are two other problems in the case more difficult of solution 

 and which often require the exercise of a closer scrutiny, and draw 

 upon all the resources of the experienced practitioner to settle satis- 

 factorily. That a horse is lame in a given leg may be easily deter- 

 mined, but when it becomes necessary to pronounce upon the query 

 as to what part, what region, what structure is affected, the easy part 

 of the task is over, and the more difficult and important, because 

 more obscure, portion of the investigation has commenced except, 

 of course, in cases of which the features are too distinctly evident to 

 the senses to admit of error. It is true that by carefully noting the 

 manner in which a lame leg is performing its functions, and closely 

 scrutinizing the motions of the whole extremity, and especially of 

 the various joints which enter into its structure ; by minutely exam- 

 ining every part of the limb ; by observing the outlines ; by testing 

 the change, if any, in temperature and the state of the sensibility- 

 all these investigations may guide the surgeon to a correct localiza- 



