98 THE STUD. 



the hock may be hupeded by the same kind of 

 occurrence, or rather want, that would in like 

 manner act on machinery of man's manufacture, 

 namely the want of a proper lubricating fluid, to 

 enable the joints to work without detrimental 

 friction. Art supplies oil or some other proper 

 mixture to manufactured machinery ; nature sup- 

 plies a description of oil to the joints of the 

 animal. Whence this fluid is generated, or by 

 what supplied, it is not our business here to enter 

 on ; suffice it to say, that sometimes from over 

 exertion this fluid no lono-er exists in sufficient 

 quantity to prevent friction of the uniting parts 

 acting in junction. Irritation from the friction 

 of these parts against each other produces intoler- 

 able pain to the animal, with the worst possible 

 sort of lameness ; a lameness that no skill, no 

 treatment, no operation, can beneficially aflect ; 

 it is absolutely incurable. 



Another kind of bone spavin proceeds from a 

 bony, or in other terms, ossific deposit, which 

 forms a junction of the small bones, of course 

 preventing the freedom of their action ; and 

 though the motion required of these small bones 

 is not much, still the total or partial prevention of 

 that action more or less lames, though not often 

 to any very serious extent, but quite enough I 

 should say to induce a purchaser to reject a horse 

 so circumstanced. With the latter kind of spavin 



