78 PATHOLOGY OF SPAVIN. 



the autumn of 1829, as sound, and was at the time remarked by 

 every person who saw him to be one of the handsomest and best 

 bred colts we ever recruited. In July 1832 he was brought to me 

 lame. I found he had a spavin, for which I ordered the ung. antim. 

 tart. ; and the result was, that, at the expiration of a month, with 

 rest, he had become sound enough to return to work, and was 

 ridden again in the ranks. In the January following, however, 

 (five months afterwards) he returned to me as lame as ever. He 

 now was fired, and subsequently turned out. In May, being once 

 more " relieved," sound enough to take his work again, he left my 

 care for duty, and continued thereat until the ensuing August, at 

 the latter end of which month he experienced an attack of pleurisy, 

 and of that died. This afforded me an opportunity of examining 

 his spavined hock, and I found such appearances, with the addi- 

 tion of the exostosis, as Mr. Goodwin has described, with evident 

 ulceration and caries of both the tibia and astragalus as well*. 



The foregoing case, while it is confirmatory — if confirmation 

 were needed of a fact now become so notorious — of the morbid 

 states of the articulations of the hock in spavin, likewise seems to 

 shew that the disease of joint exists at a very early period ; for, 

 although this horse was taken under treatment from the first 

 day he evinced lameness, yet was he never afterwards rendered 

 sound. Bloodletting from the thigh vein, purging, fomentation 

 followed up by inungation with the antimonial ointment, and a 

 month's rest, had done as much as is generally done in such cases ; 

 still, the horse was not cured of his lameness, but broke down 

 again five months afterwards, notwithstanding he was favoured 

 at duty — which was at no times hard — as much as possible : 

 the result, in fact, being much the same as we should have looked 

 for in a case of patched-up disease of the navicular joint. From 

 this, and many other similar cases, I cannot therefore help coming 

 to the conclusion, that disease of synovial membrane is occasionally 



* There are naturally — as has been before remarked — little /os.s-^e or pits 

 observable upon the trochleated surfaces of these two bones : in this case 

 these pits were much enlarged, and moreover had margins of tumid and red- 

 dened membrane, and were at their bases spotted with red, and asperous 

 to the feel, instead of smooth as in health.— F2c?e PL IV, Fig. 1 & 2. 



