334 CURB. 



other hand, every now and then, curby tumours are so prominent 

 and conspicuous that they cause great disfigurement, and are apt 

 very much to depreciate the value of the animal. 



The Nature of Curb has certainly been but imperfectly 

 understood, or we should never have had such 



Vague and varying Accounts of the disease. The funniest 

 interpretation of a curb on record is, perhaps, that narrated by the 

 late Professor Coleman, who learnt it at a horse cause on which 

 he was subpoenaed. Mr. (afterwards Lord) Erskine informed the 

 jury that the hock of the horse answered to the knee of the human 

 being, and that, as shewn by evidence he should adduce (a farrier), 

 such swellings (as curbs) proceeded from a kind oi gout! Bracken 

 regarded curb in weak "sickle-houghed" horses as an effort of 

 nature to strengthen the parts. Osmer defines curb to be, " a 

 swelling on the joint of the hinder leg, below the hock," but gives 

 no account of its pathology. White considers curb " in nature 

 similar to a strain in the back sinews, and to depend upon the 

 rupture and consequent inflammation of some vascular membranes 

 situated between the two tendons of the gastrocnemii muscles."- 

 Spooner (White's commentator) repeats the words of White, " in 

 its nature similar to a strain in the back sinews ;" adding, " it de- 

 pends upon a strain and inflammation of the strong ligament that 

 passes from the os calcis down the hack of the hock to the shank 

 hone, frequently involving the flexor sinews at the same time." 

 Professor Coleman's opinion I never learnt : I find no notice what- 

 ever on the subject in his " Lectures." 



Blaine heads his chapter on curb, " CURB OR EXTENSION OF 

 THE ligaments OF THE HOCK," and adds, in the course of his de- 

 scription, " or of the sheaths of the tendons passing from the hock 

 downwards, as of i\iQ flexor perforans'' Youatt pronounces curb 

 to be, " either a strain of the ring-like ligament which binds the 

 tendons in their place, or of the sheath of the tendons ; oftener, 

 however, of the ligament than of the sheath." 



Thus, there evidently exists among the authorities cited conside- 

 rable wavering of opinion respecting the true or exact seat even of 

 curb, to say nothing of its pathology. Whether the disease be seated 

 in ligament or sheath of tendon, or in tendon itself, is left unde- 



