IRREGULARITIES' OF THE DENTAL APPARATUS. 763 



and swollen, seem to push the dental row backward ; these parts are 

 so much the more sensitive as the extraction has taken place more 

 recently. Sometimes particles of the teeth, incompletely extracted 

 and still remaining in the maxillary bone, show themselves in front 

 of the adult teeth ; nevertheless, the incisive arcade presents an un- 

 usual aspect which the experienced eye can easily recognize. __ When 

 the foetal teeth have been extracted recently, the places which they 

 occupied are inflamed, contused, and excoriated ; for this reason it is 

 always more easy to recognize fraudulent means from the beginning. 



" Often the teeth of the inferior jaw alone are extracted ; this is 

 the true cause why, in a large number of horses, their eruption pre- 

 cedes that of the superior incisors ; and this case is too simple not to 

 be properly recognized/ 7 1 



Many authors have spoken in the same strain. Seon Rochas, 2 

 who has fully described the mode of procedure in the extraction of the 

 deciduous incisors, says that a horse three years of age, at the time 

 of the operation, would appear three months later as a four-year-old, 

 because the intermediates of the second dentition are commencing to 

 appear. 



All this, at first sight, seems very clear, but does the pulling of the 

 milk-teeth really result in an earlier eruption of the permanent teeth ? 

 The question is worthy of a careful examination. 



Everybody is not of the same opinion in this respect. De Curnieu, 

 for example, expresses himself unmistakably against the success of the 

 practice. 3 



" First," says he, " I do not believe in colts being advanced by 

 the premature extraction of the milk-teeth. 



" One day I bought a draught filly at the market of Chauny, with- 

 out horse-teeth (without adult teeth) in the superior jaw and with four 

 milk-teeth in the inferior. 



" The place of the pincers was unoccupied, the gums healthy, clean, 

 and without any appearance of a wound or cicatrix. 



" When the superior pincers came out, the lower pincers were just 

 ready to penetrate the gums. Evidently, some one intended to advance 

 the dentition of the mare. Was it advanced ? No ; the teeth were 

 extracted and that was all. 4 



1 Girard, loc. cit., p. 84, et suiv. 



2 Seon Rochas, Histoire d'un cheval de troupe, Paris, 1839, p. 26. 

 s De Curnieu, loc. cit., t. iii. p. 527. 



* It is only proper to remark that De Curnieu has not proved that the pincers had been 

 pulled. It is a simple presumption on his part, which adds nothing to the proof of his con- 

 clusion. 



