TREATMENT OF CANKER. 455 



not be required. Should the disease have made such incursions 

 into the foot as to render it impossible, after the necessary paring 

 has been made, to find sufficient hold of crust for nailing a shoe 

 to, the dressing must be bolstered up with an abundance of 

 coarse tow, over which a piece of sacking or coarse cloth may be 

 wrapped, the whole being bound together with tape, or, what 

 proves an exceedingly useful ligature in such cases, rope-yarn 

 or tar-cord, with which the foot, thus thickly clothed, ought to 

 be cleverly and tightly packed up. 



A " sharp" dressing of this description will be likely — 

 especially when extensively used — to excite a good deal of pain 

 in the foot, and this may be followed by some amount of consti- 

 tutional irritation ; indeed, so irresistible is the appeal made from 

 such effects sometimes, that, for humanity's sake, if not from a 

 sense of danger, it becomes necessary to remove the dressings, 

 and immerse the cankered foot in a warm bath, succeeded by a 

 poultice, and to give the animal some medicine, should he not 

 have already had any : I say " already," because it ought to 

 have been mentioned, that, in all such cases, it is an excellent 

 practice to administer in the first instance a full dose of cathartic 

 medicine, which, coming into operation about the time that the 

 sloughing is at its height, is likely to be attended with the best 

 results. 



Should nothing call for the removal of the dressing, however, 

 it had better remain undisturbed for two, if not for three days, 

 depending upon the circumstance of the horse having been in 

 the stable the while, or at work ; for the process of sloughing 

 is found to go on quicker under work or motion than while at 

 rest : shewing that work of the kind that has been recommended, 

 provided the ground be not wet or muddy, so far from being 

 objectionable, will be found beneficial, whenever the patient is 

 able to take it. When the dressing comes to be removed, the 

 aspect of the cankered parts will be found completely changed. 

 There will remain comparatively little or no fetor ; while the 

 fungus, which before was porous and full of ichorous oozings, 

 and possessed a degree of transparency from the discharges 

 standing in globules upon its surface, has now turned an opaque 



