326 THE HORSE. 



other, will form the most advantageous mode of firing. The destroying 

 of deeply seated inflammation, by the exciting of violent inflammation on 

 the skin, is as well obtained ; and common sense will determine, that in no 

 way can the pressure which results from the contraction of the skin be so 

 advantageously employed, to which we may add, that it often leaves not 

 the slightest blemish. 



SETONS 



Are pieces of tape or cord, passed by means of an instrument resembhng a 

 large needle either through abscesses, or the base of ulcers with deep 

 sinuses, or between the skin and the muscular or other substances be- 

 neath. They are retained there by the ends being tied together, or by a 

 knot at each end. The tape is moved in the wound twice or thrice in the 

 day, and occasionally wetted v^ith spirit of turpentine, or some acrid 

 liquid, in order to increase the inflammation which it produces, or the dis- 

 charge which is intended to be established. 



In abscesses, such as tumours in the withers or the poll, and when passed 

 from the summit to the very bottom of the swelling, setons are highly 

 useful, as discharging the fluid and suffering any fresh quantity of it that 

 may be secreted to flow out ; and, by the degree of infl.ammation which they 

 excite on the inside of the tumour, stimulating it to throw out healthy gra- 

 nulations which gradually occupy and fill the hollow. In deep fistulous 

 wounds they are indispensable, for except some orifice be made for the 

 matter to flow from the bottom of the wound, it will continue to eat deeper 

 into it, and the healing process can never be accomplished. On these 

 accounts, a seton passed through the bottom of the ulcer in poll-evil and 

 fistulous withers is of so much benefit. 



Setons are sometimes useful by promoting a discharge in the neigh- 

 bourhood of an inflamed part, and thus diverting and carrying away a 

 portion of the fluids which overload^ or would otherwise more distend 

 the vessels of that part : thus a seton is placed in the cheek with consi- 

 derable advantage, when the eyes are inflamed ; we confess, however, 

 that we far prefer a rowel under the jaw. 



With this view, and to excite a new and different inflammation in the 

 neighbourhood of a part already inflamed, and especially so deeply seated 

 and so difficult to be got at as the navicular joint, a seton has occasionally 

 been used with manifest benefit, but we must peremptorily object to 

 the indiscriminate use of the frog-seton for alm.ost every disease of the 

 frog or the foot. 



In inflammations of extensive organs setons afford only feeble aid. 

 Their action is too circumscribed. In inflammation of the chest or the 

 intestines a rowel is preferable to a seton ; and a blister is far better than 

 either of them. 



On the principle of exciting the absorbents to action for the removal of 

 tumours, as spavin or splent, a blister is quicker in its action, and far 

 more effectual than "any seton ; and firing is still more energetic. Many 

 horses have been blemished for life by the seton being torn out, and ulce- 

 rations, difficult to Ileal, having been produced ; while week after week has 

 often passed on, and the owner has been deprived of the use of the animal, 

 without the tumour, or the lameness w^hich it caused, being in the least 

 dea'ree diminished. 



