DISEASES OF THE HORSE. 279 



have said touching these elementaiy truths will probabh^ be sufBcient 

 to facilitate a clear understanding of the requirements essential to 

 the perfection and regularity which characterize the normal perform- 

 ance of the various movements which result in the accomplishment of' 

 the action of locomotion. So long as the bones, the muscles and their 

 tendons, the joints with their cartilages, their ligaments and their 

 S3'novial structure; the nerves and the controlling influences which 

 the}^ exercise over all, with the blood vessels which distribute to every 

 part, however minute, the vitalizing fluid which sustains the whole 

 fabric in being and activity — so long as these various constituents and 

 adjuncts of animal life preserve their normal exemption from disease, 

 traumatism, and pathological change, the function of locomotion will 

 continue to be performed with perfection and efliciency. 



But, on the other hand, let any element of disease become implanted 

 in one or several of the parts destined for combined action, any change 

 or irregularity of form, dimensions, location, or action occur in any 

 portion of the apparatus — any obstruction or misdirection of vital 

 power take place, any interference with the order of the phenomena 

 of normal nature, any loss of harmony and lack of balance be betraj^ed, 

 and we have in the result the condition of lameness. 



DEFINITION OF LAMENESS. 



Physiology. — Comprehensively and universally considered, then, 

 the term lameness signifies any irregularity or derangement of the 

 function of locomotion irrespective of the cause which produced it or 

 the degree of its manifestation. However slightly or severely it may 

 be exhibited, it is all the same. The nicest observation may be 

 demanded for its detection, and it may need the most thoroughly 

 trained powers of discernment to identify and locate it, as in cases 

 where the animal is said to be fainting, tend£}\ or to go sore. On the 

 contrary, the i^atient may be so far afl'ected as to refuse utterly to use 

 an injured leg, and under compulsory motion keep it raised from the 

 ground, and prefer to travel on three legs rather than to bear any por- 

 tion of his weight upon the afilicted member. In these two extremes, 

 and in all the intermediate degrees, the patient is simply lame — 

 pathognomonic minutiae being considered and settled in a place of 

 their own. 



This last condition of disabled function — lameness on three legs — 

 and many of the lower degrees of simple lameness are yqvj easy of 

 detection, but the first or mere tenderness, or soreness, may be very 

 difiicult to identifj', and at times very serious results have followed 

 from the obscurity which has enveloped the early stages of the malad}''. 

 For it may easily occur that in the absence of the treatment Avhich an 

 early correct diagnosis would have indicated, an insidious ailment may 

 so take advantage of the lapse of time as to root itself too deeply into 



