convenienced to warrant their being taken out of service, yet a 

 lame horse, no matter how slightly affected, should not be con- 

 tinued in service unless it can be positively established that the 

 degree of discomfort occasioned by the claudication is small and 

 the work to be done by the animal, of the sort that will not 

 aggravate the condition. 



Subjects that are very lame — so lame that little weight is 

 borne by the affected member — are, of course, unfit for service 

 and as a rule are not difficult of diagnosis. For instance, a frac- 

 ture of the second phalanx would cause much more lameness than 

 an injury to the lateral ligament of the coronary joint wherein 

 there had occurred only a slight sprain, and though crepitation 

 is not recognized, the diagnostician is not justified in excluding 

 the possibility of fracture, if the lameness seems disproportion- 

 ate to the apparent first cause. 



The course taken by cases of lameness is as variable as the 

 degree of its manifestation, and no one can definitely predict the 

 duration of any given cause of claudication. 



Because of the fact that horses are not often good self -nurses 

 at best, and that it is difficult to enforce proper care for the parts 

 affected, one can not wisely state that resolution will promptly 

 follow in an acute involvement, nor can he predict that the case 

 will or will not become chronic. Experience has proved that 

 complete or partial recovery may result, or again, that no change 

 may occur in any given case, and that in some instances even 

 where rational treatment is early administered, a decided aggra- 

 vation of the condition may follow unaccountably. 



However, because of the economic element to be reckoned with, 

 it is of some value to be able to give a fairly accurate prognosis 

 in the handling of cases of lameness, as in the majority of in- 

 stances the treatment and manner of after-care are determined 

 largely by the expense that any prescribed line of attention will 

 occasion. 



A case of acute bone spavin in a horse of little value is not 

 generally treated in a manner that will incur an expense equiva- 

 lent to one-half the value of the subject. The fact is always to 

 be considered in such cases, that even where ideal conditions favor 

 proi)er treatment, the outcome is uncertain. Where less than 



