414 



approximate knowledge of its lesions was had, it vras usually desig- 

 nated as "founder." 



In country districts and amongst the great majority of the laity 

 this name is yet almost exclusively used; and undoubtedly it was first 

 so employed because it best expressed the physical inability or 

 disinclination upon the part of the patient to proceed in his gait, 

 resembling thereby a ship similarly disabled. That it could have 

 been adopted upon any other ground hardly seems possible, for the 

 etymology of the term does not indicate that it was so used because it 

 contained even the most remote intimation either as to the seat of the 

 disease, its nature or its cause. 



Of the nature of laminitis but little is to be said, it being a simple 

 inflammation of the senstive laminae of the feet, characterized b}^ the 

 general phenomena attending inflammation of the skin and mucous 

 membranes, producing no constitutional disturbances except those 

 dependent upon the local disease, and having a strong tendency, in 

 severe cases, to destructive disorganization of the tissues affected. 



Causes. — The causes of laminitis ai^e as wide and variable as in any 

 of the local inflammations, and may be divided into two classes — tlie 

 predisposing and exciting. 



Predisposing causes. — From personal observations I do not know 

 that any particular construction of foot or any special breed of horses 

 is thereby predisposed to tliis disease, neither can I find anything to 

 warrant the assumption that it is in any way hereditary; so that while 

 we may easily cultivate a predisposition of the disease upon the part 

 of the tissues subject to become affected, the disease itself does not 

 originate Avithout an exciting cause. Like most other tissues, a pre- 

 disposition to inflammation may be induced in the sensitive lamime 

 by any cause which lessens their power of withstjinding the work 

 imposed on them. It exists to an extent in those animals unaccus- 

 to]i\ed to work, particularly if they are plethoric, and in all those tjiat 

 have been previous subjects of the disease, for the same rule hdlds 

 good here .that we find in so many diseases — /. e., that one attack 

 impairs the functional activity of the affected tissues and thus renders 

 them more easy of a subsequent inflammation. 



Unusual excitement by determining an excessive blood supply, bad 

 shoeing, careless paring of the feet by removing the sole support, as 

 well as high calkings without corresponding toe pieces, must be 

 included under this head. 



Exciting causes.— The exciting causes of laminitis are many and 

 varied, the most common being concussion, overexertion, exhaustion, 

 rapid changes of temperature, ingestion of various foods, purgatives, 

 and the oft-mentioned metastasis. 



(1) Concussion acts as a producer of this disease by the local over- 

 stimulation which it occasions, the excessive excitement being fol- 

 lowed by an almost complete exhaustion of the functional activity of 



