36 STRUCTURE OF THE LEGS. [BOOK I. 



contiguous parts, consequently, undergo greater 

 fatigue than, in the event of finer symmetry, would 

 have fallen to their share ; and the extraordinary 

 friction or working thereof, occasions, at a day 

 more or less remote, the exhaustion of its moisture 

 (see Section 21) and the lodgement of acrimonious 

 matter in the cellular membrane, which appears in 

 the form of tumour, &c. This protuberant appear- 

 ance of the muscle is most visible at the stifle 

 [N. 30], and on the shoulder [M. 13] just above 

 the elbow, whilst the horse is going fast. 



A more minute inquiry, however, on those points 

 would lead us away — too far from our main pur- 

 pose, at present ; let us, therefore, return to notice, 

 in the first place, the structure of the legs of such 

 horses as, by their untoward position, entail on 

 them the chances of producing some one or other 

 of those evils that are known to afflict certain 

 horses, incurably, to the end of their days. Thus, 

 some are known to tread on the inner quarter of 

 the hoof, others on the outside, without the real 

 cause being ever ascertained, and remedies are 

 frequently applied that have not the remotest 

 chance of achieving any good, on that very account. 

 Some horses " cut," in consequence of treading on 

 the outer quarter ; on the contrary, by punishing 

 the inner quarter in treading, others contract a 

 disposition to " quittor and ringbone;" both in- 

 stances of mal-formatio-tiy or bad built (as we call it), 

 produce splents, diseases of the frog, of the sensible 

 sole, and of the coronet, as the case may be : how it 



