REMEDIES FOR SPAVIN. 89 



for the cure of spavin than in the case of ahnost any other dis- 

 ease. Some of these have been truly mechanical, rude, and even 

 barbarous in their nature ; while others have been based upon sci- 

 entific views, such as have been entertained by their projectors; 

 though, after all, as I have already more than once had occasion 

 to observe, are we at the present day found practising blistering 

 and firing, the same as was practised a hundred years ago by our 

 professional predecessors. 



The notions respecting the nature of spavin of the farriers of 

 former days were precisely the same they are with the profession- 

 ally unlearned of the present day : they find the horse lame in the 

 hind limb, it is pretty evident his lameness proceeds from his hock, 

 and it is manifest he has a bony tumour thereupon, and, therefore, 

 the natural inference was — has been all along, indeed, until Mr. 

 Goodwin demonstrated its fallacy — that the exostosis was the whole 

 and sole cause of the lameness. Nothing, therefore, seemed required 

 but to get rid of this tumour ; and the simplest and readiest way of 

 accomplishing this, appeared at once to 



Saw or chisel or rasp off the exostosis. And, so far as 

 the prompt removal of an osseous tumour goes, surgeons up to the 

 present day have devised no simpler, safer, or more summary mode 

 of proceeding than by operation. Many years ago, a person who 

 had obtained some celebrity for curing spavined horses, came from 

 one of our northern counties to London, and in consequence of re- 

 presentations made by him to the Board of Ordnance, had permis- 

 sion granted him to make certain experiments at Woolwich on 

 horses belonging to the Royal Artillery, to be selected, on account 

 of having spavins, by my father. This man was dexterous enough 

 in his handicraft. He cleverly dissected the skin off the exostosis, 

 and afterwards, with a common iron chisel and wooden mallet, 

 chiselled off the osseous tumour, and then brought the divided 

 portions of skin together, and, if I remember aright, secured them • 

 by ligature. So far all appeared plausible enough. But the ope- 

 rator had not calculated on, or seemingly cared for, the consequences 

 of an operation so purely mechanical and rude. He had not fore- 

 seen what was sure to follow, inflammation, and inflammation it 

 might be, and in some of the cases proved, of that acute and de- 



VOL. IV. N 



