614 THE DISEASES OF THE HORSE 



the injurious effects which are so apt to follow. The horse contracts a habit 

 of stepping on his toes, to prevent hurting his navicular structures ; and 

 hence the frog is not used, the heels of the crust and the bars are not 

 strained, and there being no stimulus to the soft parts which secrete them, 

 they waste and contract in size. If the human hand is allowed to lie idle, 

 the palm and the insides of the fingers are covered with a delicate cuticle, 

 which affords so poor a protection to the cutis, that, on using it with any 

 kind of hard work, it actually separates, and leaves an exposed surface, which 

 speedily inflames. But by gradually exposing the same hand to pressure, a 

 thickened and tougher cuticle is seci'eted ; and this will bear any moderate 

 amount of pressure or friction without injury. Nevertheless, even the 

 hand so prepared must be continually stimulated by work, or the skin 

 returns to its original delicate state, and is then exposed to the same risk 

 of injury as before. So it is with the horse's foot, even in a state of 

 health ; but this is far more marked after an attack of disease. The 

 tendency then is to produce the natural horny growths of a smaller sub- 

 stance than before ; and if the secreting surfaces are not stimulated by 

 pressure, they become doubly idle, and the frog, as well as the adjacent 

 parts beneath the navicular bone, shows a wasted and shrivelled appear- 

 ance. To avoid the risk of these ill consequences, the horse should be 

 placed, for two or three hours daily, on a bed of wet clay, which will allow 

 the shoe to sink into it, but will yet be tenacious enough to make firm and 

 steady pressure on the frog, while its low temperature will keep down 

 inflammation. No plan is of so much service in producing what is called 

 expansion of the heels and growth of the frog as this ; not, as is commonly 

 supposed, from the clay mechanically pressing the heels out, but from the 

 stimulus of its pressure causing the soft parts to secrete more horn, and of 

 a sounder quality than before. 



Should these remedies fail in restoring the foot affected with navi- 

 cular disease to a healthy state, recourse can only be had to the operation 

 of neurotomy, which is perfectly efficacious in removing the lameness ; and 

 if there is no ulceration, and merely an adhesion of the tendon to the bone, 

 it will, by causing the horse to step more on his heels, effect an absolute 

 improvement in the shape of the foot, and hence it is considered to have 

 produced a cure. And for all practical purposes it is a cure, inasmuch as a 

 horse previously useless can be made to work sound and perhaps continue 

 so for years. A good deal of unreasoning prejudice exists against this 

 operation, as many 2:)ersons cannot be convinced that a horse is not more 

 likely to fall because he cannot feel his feet, and the very unfair comparison 

 is made between a really sound horse and an unnerved one, whereas the 

 comparison should be as between a hopeless cripple and a serviceable animal. 

 The late Mr. George Williams, who for so many years held the appointment 

 of veterinary surgeon to the Queen, was an earnest advocate of unnerving, 

 and perhaps operated on more horses than any other surgeon of his day. 

 He, like the present editor, who is proud of having been his pupil, rode 

 many unnerved liorses and found them as sure-footed as others. I have 

 known unnerved horses die of old age and of all sorts of diseases, but 

 subjects that have not been operated on until the bone is extensively 

 diseased are liable to break down either by fracture of the navicular bone 

 itself or rupture of the tendons, and then the toe turns up, the pastern goea 



