142 



movements which can be excited by galvanism soon after death. 

 That it is a nerve-affection is admitted by all writers on the 

 subject, but what part of the nervous system is the precise locale 

 of the disease is a problem that yet remains to be solved. 



PERCIVAL'S OPINION 



is shown in the following quotation. " Those who suppose it 

 to be a muscular affection, mistake, I conceive, the effect for 

 the cause. I choose rather to refer its seat to the spinal mar- 

 row, or to the nervous trunks passing between it and the affected 

 muscle." Professor Spooner was not disposed to dogmatise 

 upon a question upon which so little light could be thrown by 

 anatomical investigation. Lesions of the medulla spinalis and 

 of the larger branches of the nerves had frequently occurred 

 when there was no evidence of Stringhalt, and a dissection of 

 the worst cases of Stringhalt had revealed no evidence what- 

 ever of a lesion of the nervous trunks or branches. 



r 

 t 



MICROSCOPICAL RESEARCH 



had also failed to reveal any abnormality of structure. That the 

 disease resulted from a functional disturbance of nerve-force, 

 he thought there could be no doubt whatever. He had found 

 on one occasion a spicula of bone pressing against a nerve in 

 the spine; on another a small abscess pressing against the 

 nerve. He had also found a thorn imbedded in the nerve of a 

 subject of Stringhalt, but as he had found thorns so frequently 

 in other than Stringhalt cases, he attached no importance what- 

 ever to this latter circumstance. 



PROFESSOR SPOONER'S FINAL JUDGMENT 



of the matter was that the true explanation, if ever it could 

 admit of verification would be that of a partial paralysis of the 

 nerves of the gastrocnemii muscles. These muscles are so 

 arranged that they antagonize or check any undue action each 

 of the other, and thus produce easy and harmonious move- 



