182 TREATMENT OF NAVICULARTHRITIS. 



In a case wherein such treatment as this— intermediate as it is 

 in intensity, and length of time occupied, between the mildest and 

 severest forms of treatment — fails to afford the expected relief, or 

 in a case wherein either from consideration of its nature, or from 

 its being a relapse, or other circumstance's, it is resolved from the 

 first to place the lame horse under that course of treatment which 

 presents the surest prospects of ultimate success, sufficient length 

 of time being granted by his owner to put it into effective execu- 

 tion, the plan to be adopted — which I beUeve, at all hands, is 

 reckoned the most effectual — is as follows : — • 



When there is plain evidence to shew, or even reason to sus- 

 pect, that inflammation continues unabated in the navicular joint, 

 take blood, not once only, but twice, from the toe of the foot, nay ! 

 thrice, if required, which is rarely the case, to the amount, under 

 ordinary circumstances, of six or eight pints each time; and as 

 soon as convenient after the last bleeding, i. e., as soon as the 

 wound made by the lancet is sufficiently healed to bear having a 

 tip nailed upon the hoof*, have the coronet and pastern, Q.r\d fetlock 

 as well, closely trimmed or rather shorn of their hair, and over the 

 entire surface apply a strong blister ; the horse being fastened up 

 in his stall afterwards, so as not to be able to lie down, according 

 to the usual mode of securing blistered horses. After standing for 

 three or four or five days in his stall, according as more or less 

 swelling of the leg ensues, the blistered parts may be well oiled, 

 and the patient may be turned into a loose box ; but I would not 

 have this box a large one, because in his present condition quietude 

 is much to be preferred to moving about. Such a blister will cause 

 the cuticle, and with it the hair, to come off, and the horse will 

 certainly not have his leg restored to be in a condition for work 

 under a month or six weeks, the blood-letting and blistering alto- 

 gether occupying about a couple of months. And unless such time 

 be given up for the treatment, the veterinarian had much better, 

 for his own credit's sake, be without the case. Indeed, in many 

 cases, some two or three weeks more will be found desirable either 



* It may not be requisite or even advisable in a strong-horned foot to put 

 on any shoe : in a brittle or weak-crusted foot a tip prevents fracture of the 

 hoof 



