32 OKNERAL OIkSER VAT IONS ON 



we proceed to the manual examination of the affected leg and 

 foot, in doing which we must bear in mind we are searching for 

 two (out of the four) signs of inflammation, heat and swelling : 

 the pain felt being evinced by the action and by the standing, and 

 the redness being through the hair imperceptible. The inflam- 

 mation taking its rise in the synovial membrane being, generally 

 speaking, sub-acute or chronic in its character, we are not to 

 expect any very striking increase of temperature ; neither are we 

 to look for any thing beyond fulness, by way of swelling, seeing 

 that the increase of synovial fluid is but very moderate, and that, 

 unless the case be one of combined sprain, there is no very 

 remarkable infiltration into the surrounding integument. A 

 careful and deliberate examination, however, will seldom fail to 

 detect heat, if not swelling, of the joint affected, or in its imme- 

 diate vicinity ; and there is no better way of arriving at this 

 ascertainment — one of the utmost importance to us in determining 

 the nature of the case — than that of repeatedly comparing the 

 grasp and feel of the supposed lame joint with the correspondent 

 joint of the sound limb : one feels warmer and rounder or fuller 

 than the other ; the perception of its natural prominences being 

 obscured or obliterated by this fulness. Should the joint be 

 one of those incased within the hoof, out of the reach of the 

 hand, though no fulness be perceptible upon the coronet, still 

 heat may be felt there or within the hollow of the heel, to a 

 greater amount in one foot than the other : added to which, in a 

 case of foot lameness, it is of great importance that we should pay 

 every attention to the form and condition of the hoof It is pos- 

 sible that, by compression or some artificial motion given to the 

 supposed lame joint, we may succeed in eliciting some further 

 indications of tenderness in it : these are signs, however, upon 

 which we cannot often relv. When we come to talk about the 

 animal's "flinching" from this or that twist or squeeze of the 

 hand, there is apt to be so much deception from some unusual 

 sensitiveness or nervousness or fear the horse may evince under 

 examination, or else from lack of these attributes, that it is diffi- 

 cult, in most cases perhaps impossible, to come to any safe con- 

 clusions from such manipulations. 



