802 DISEASES AND TllEIE TEEATMENT. 



operation, or have the feet injured by shoeing, or exposed in any- 

 way to injury, such as taking nails and so on. 



This has been an operation that for many years has been made 

 the most of by jockeys and unprincipled persons, by cheating in 

 two ways: First, by operating upon a horse so as to remove the 

 lameness, and then trade or sell quickly as a sound animal, and if 

 not suspected, there would be no way of detecting it until too late. 

 Hence there should be a law passed that all horses having this 

 operation performed upon them, should be branded so as to be 

 known. If there is any suspicion of such a thing, it can be easily 

 proved by sticking a pin into the coronet, when, of course if the 

 nerves had been severed, there would be no sensibility. 



The second would be done somewhat as follows: Parties would 

 travel rapidly through the country, assuming that for a sum of 

 money they would perform an operation that would cure any 

 case of lameness in the feet. By their promising to give perfect 

 satisfaction or no pay, unsuspecting owners would be induced to- 

 bring in their horses for treatment. No matter though the horse 

 may have been driven twenty miles that morning, with his feet 

 full of heat and inflammation, and unsuitable for the operation, 

 the hoi'se would be thrown down, the nerves severed, when he 

 would be trotted up and down the street to show the apparently 

 wonderful effect. The owner, of course, would be delighted, and 

 pay the fee, when he would be told he could drive the horse home. 

 The result would be that from the amount of inflammation pro- 

 duced in the foot, there would be ulceration of the coronet and 

 loss of the hoof, making the destruction of the horse inevitable. 

 This led to the operation being brought into great disrepute and 

 suspicion. 



It is, of course, advisable in all cases to have a competent 

 veterinary surgeon employed, if available, to perform this opera- 

 tion . 





