HIP-JOINT (oil round-bone) LAMENESS. 225 



This is a subject on which information is a good deal needed ; 

 meanwhile, we must content ourselves with what we find on 

 record, and with stating such results as have been afforded by 

 our own experience. 



Hip-joint (or Round Bone) Lameness. 



Eight years ago — in 1840 — Mr. T. W. Mayer, veterinary sur- 

 geon, at Newcastle-under-Lyne, published a paper in The VETE- 

 RINARIAN on this subject, which had the two-fold effect of rectify- 

 ing the erroneous opinions formerly entertained respecting its pre- 

 valence, and of warning veterinarians of falling into the opposite 

 error of regarding it as an occurrence of extreme rarity; at the 

 same time it has put us in possession of a good amount of useful 

 information, of which it is our intention to avail ourselves on the 

 present occasion. 



" So strong of late years," says Mr. Mayer, " has been the tide 

 of prejudice against the possibility of any lameness occurring in 

 this joint, that we occasionally overlook it, and attribute the 

 grounds of the mischief as resident in the hock : nor can we wonder 

 at this, when, in the slighter shades of lameness in a hinder ex- 

 tremity, the effect upon progression is so very similar." 



Our own observation would lead us to the belief that the hip- 

 joint of the horse is rarely found in a state of derangement without 

 there being some sprain, contusion, slip-up, fall, or other injury 

 connected with the ailment; and then we, for our own part, think 

 that it is a common seat of the lameness accruing from the injury, 

 in consequence of its being a part very liable under falls, con- 

 tusions, and certain kinds of sprains, to receive injury. At the 

 same time, we must admit that too often, in cases of supposed hip- 

 joint lameness, much of the medical opinion is founded in conjec- 

 ture, there being, as Mr. Mayer has justly observed, at times a good 

 deal of similarity in the halting produced by disease or injury of 

 hip and hock, while in the case of the former no external sign shews 

 itself whereby we can, either to our own satisfaction or that of our 

 employer, demonstrate the nature of the case. At other times, 



VOL. IV. G g 



