DISEASES OF THE SKIN AND EARS. . 219 



ever why the farmer should encounter- it any more frequently 

 than the trooper. We trust that to few of our readers the 

 following adyice will be applicable, but those to whom it is 

 can not act upon it too promptly : Throw out the great piles 

 of manure that have been accumulating in your stable, and 

 in which your horse has been so long standing, to the great 

 detriment of his health and vigor, and, instead, give him a 

 good bed of dry straw or sawdust. Do this, and you need have 

 little fear of being compelled to undergo the trouble or an- 

 noyance of treating any cases of this disease. 



TREATMENT. 



The corrosive liniment will prove as efficacious for thrush 

 as it is for scratches, if the affection is local and independent 

 of any other. If some other disease of the foot has caused 

 it, cure that first. The liniment should be applied by wet- 

 ting a little string of tow or piece of cloth with it, and press- 

 ing this into the cleft of the frog and the corresponding part 

 of the heel. Do this at night, and remove the tow or cloth 

 the next morning. Thus continue as long as may be neces- 

 sary, with intervals of omission every third or fourth day. 



CRACKED HEELS, OR GREASE. 



This is but another form of the disease, two of whose 

 developments we have already considered. It more nearly 

 resembles thrush, however, than it does scratches. It is en- 

 tirely confined to the back part of the foot, called the heel — 

 a locality that scratches attack much less frequently, but 

 which is the exact seat of thrush. In respect to the puru- 

 lent exudations by which it is accompanied, it is still more 

 like the latter. 



Some other, and perhaps more obscure, disease of the foot 

 is very commonly the origin of this. In numerous instances, 

 it is not a local disease, but an oozing out through the pores 

 of the skin of a thin matter from some deeper-seated ulcera- 

 tion, generally that attending the disease of either the coffin or 

 the navicular joint, which has been described in Chapter IV. 



