TENDON: MUSCLE— ITS CONSTRUCTION. 29 



the body are more wide than long ; in a good measure, squarish, oval, or tn- 



anguhir, according to their uses. They have heen compared, with good reason 

 to the sha[)e of flat fish, some being long and narrow, hke the sole, others 

 wide, Uke the plaice. At their ends, niuscles often terminate in a much stron- 

 ger substance, closer in texture, inelastic, bending with facility, and insensible, 

 answering the same pur|toses, but occupying much less room than muscle. 

 These are tendinous, and the horse which is well kept, having the tendons 

 strong and vigorous, is bi>ld, strong, and "sinewy," moves his limbs with 

 agility, and gets over his work to admiration, by picking his feet off' the ground 

 well and re[»lacing them (as you see while he is going) within a hair's breadth 

 of the spot you may mark out for them to pitch upon. On the legs, tendon 

 supplies the place of muscle, wholly so in blood-horses, less in the cart-horse 

 breed. Muscle is constituted of blood deposited in the membrane, innume- 

 rable small arteries, some of which are scarcely visible, terminating within 

 each muscle, by a kind of doubling up, or curl, 

 as shown in the margin; within each of these 

 a correspondent vein is twined, and the whole 

 being covered with the finest membrane, con- 

 stitutes a gland. Herein it is that the veins 

 commence their share in the work of circulat- 

 ing the blood afresh, as we shall see in the se- 

 quel, and the lymphatics obtain the watery particles into which the morbid 

 matter of those solids are converted : those figures receive the name of " glands." 

 In blood-horses (natives of hot climates), as we have seen, tendon supplies 

 the place of muscle, or flesh, upon the limbs particularly, which are always 

 finer than those of other breeds ; this accounts why our fleshy horses in sultry 

 weather, or hot stables, feel the greatest lassitude, even to weakness, whilst 

 those of full blooti seem invigorated by the same circumstance. When, how- 

 ever, the atmosphere of the stable be moist as well as hot, both breeds suffer 

 equally in one way or another ; laxity of fibre and profuse perspiration, with 

 weakness, follow, and this producing an obnoxious effect upon the excrema- 

 tory organs, occasions in stables those stinking ammoniacal vapours that de- 

 stroy the lungs, by disposing them to contract inflammation. 



28. Besides the Glands just alluded to, they are situated in and about tne 

 solids and more secluded parts, and so small and concealed as to be scarcely 

 exposed to the sight or touch, unless when inflamed and enlarged by disease, 

 other larger and more evident ones occupy the hinder part of the animal, of 

 which I shall speak in their place. They are, 1st the liver; 2d, the kidneys; 

 ancj 3d, the testicles ; the functions of each being tolerably well known. See 

 sections 52 — 55. All glands, of whatever size or shape, are employed in se- 

 cretion, taking up and separating from other matters that quantity of watery 

 particles which is constantly escaping out of one-part of the system into 

 another, by means of the cellular membrane, as described at sections 21 and 

 22. The smaller glands, just now described, have each a small tube attached 

 to it, which seems intended to hold the acrid, or otherwise noxious, matter 

 which its lymphatic had refused to take up, as being at variance with its func- 

 tion ; here it remains concealed, until the proper occasion arrives for carrying 

 it off, which may be found by one of the three natural evacuations; but these 

 failing, it is clear disease of one sort or other must ensue. Perspiration seems 

 to be its most natural mode of passing off, unless the demand for that kind 

 of evacuation happens to be low, and then it is drawn to the kidneys, (sect. 22). 

 But, if the discharge by dung has been so copious as to afford too Httle of this 

 acrid matter (essential probably in a certain degree) by means of the absorb- 

 ents of the intestines, then, and in that case, it is taken up once more. Wheu 

 the animal's spirits are low, the absorption imperfect, and this offensive matter 



