REMEDIES FOR SPAVIN. 95 



tions of his surgeon, touching his walking upon or using the affected 

 Jimb 1 On this point, I imagine, we cannot have better authority 

 than Sir Benjamin Brodie. " When the cartilages of a joint,'' 

 says Sir Benjamin*, " are ulcerated, it may well be supposed that 

 the motion of their surfaces on each other must be favourable to 

 the progress of ulceration. I have known some cases in which 

 rest alone was sufficient to produce a cure. In all cases the symp^ 

 toms of the disease are aggravated by any considerable exercise ; 

 and we may, therefore, conclude that the keeping of the limb in a 

 state of ^perfect quietude is a very important, if not the most im- 

 portant, circumstance to be attended to in the treatment." Do 

 we not keep horses standing quiet, or in confined apartments, in 

 treating them for navicular disease ] And that is but another form 

 of ulcerative disease of joint. Setting, however, all analogy out 

 of the question, I can positively out of my own experience assert, 

 that spavined horses that are rested during treatment will derive 

 thereby a benefit of which those that are turned out will be de- 

 prived ; and, further, that I have seen cases of recent spavin re- 

 lieved to a degree approaching to soundness by " rest alone." 



I know private practitioners meet with difficulties in keeping 

 lame horses up in stables, or in providing boxes for them. The 

 stall of the invalid is wanted for his working substitute or suc- 

 cessor. Then there is to be considered the keep of the lame and 

 useless horse, and how much less the cost of such would be at 

 grass or straw-yard. Still, whatever weight these considerations 

 may have with the proprietor of the horse, the veterinarian is in 

 duty bound to give him to understand that his lame servant will 

 stand a very much better chance of recovery under one plan of 

 treatment than under the other; and that, should the remedies 

 used fail in the horse that is turned out, or taking exercise, he 

 must ascribe the failure to the lack of that quietude which is 

 found so desirable towards the cure of spavin. 



It is possible it may be argued, in opposition to what I have 

 stated on the desirableness of rest or quietude, that spavined horses 



* In his " Pathological and Surgical Observations on the Diseases of the 

 Joints," p. 142-3, 3d edit. 



