270 



incnrriiig injuries which may demaud the best skill of the veterina- 

 rian practitioner to repair. And this is not alone true of casualties 

 which belong to the class of external and traumatic cases, but includes 

 as well those of a kind perhaps more numerous, which may result in 

 lesions of internal parts, frequently the most serious and obscure of all 

 in their nature and effects. 



The horse is too important a factor in the practical details of human 

 life and fills too large a place in the business and pleasure of the world 

 to justify any indifference to his needs and his physical comfort or neg- 

 lect in respect to the preservation of his peculiar powers for usefulness. 

 In this connection it is hardly necessary to allude to sentimental con- 

 siderations of " humanity," so called — a word which too often becomes 

 a wretched misnomer when one recalls the neglects, the mistreatment, 

 the overtasking and other cruelties, in many instances tortures, of 

 which he becomes the helpless victim. In entering somewhat largely, 

 therefore, upon a review of the subject, and treating in detail of the 

 causes, the symptoms, the progress, the treatment, the results, and the 

 consequences of lameness in the horse, we are performing a duty which 

 needs no word of apology or justification. The subject explains and 

 justifies itself, and is its own vindication and illustration if any are 

 needed. 



The function of locomotion is performed by the action of two princi- 

 pal systems of organs, known in anatomical and i)hysiological termin- 

 ology as ^^assu'c and ac^ii'e, the WMScZes performing the active and the 

 bones the passive portion of the movement, the necessary connection 

 between the co operating organism being effected by means of a vital 

 contact by which the muscle is attached to the bone at certain determi- 

 nate points on the surface of the latter. These points of attachment 

 appear in the form of sometimes an eminence, sometimes a depression, 

 sometimes a border or an angle, or again as a mere roughness, but 

 each perfectly fulfilling its purpose, while the necessary motion is 

 provided for by the formation of the ends of the long bones into the 

 requisite articulations, joints, or hinges. Every motion is the product 

 of the contraction of one or more of the muscles, which, as it acts 

 upon the bony levers, gives rise to a movement of extension or flexion, 

 abduction or adduction, rotation or circumduction. The movement 

 of abduction is that which passes from and that of adduction that 

 which passes towards the median line, or the center of the body. The 

 movements of flexion and extension are too well understood to need 

 defining. It is the combination and rapid alternations of these m-ove- 

 ments which produce the different postures and various gaits of the 

 living animal, and it is their interruption and derangement, from what- 

 soever cause, which constitutes the pathological condition of lameness. 



A concise examination of the general anatomy of these organs, how. 

 ever, must precede the consideration of the pathological questions per- 

 taining to the subject. A statement such as we have just given, con- 



