Chapter XXIY, - 



THE FOOT.. 

 Pricking in Shoeing, Stepping on Nails, Glass, etc. 



THE foo'Jc is made up of the coffin-bone (os pedis), the lower end of 

 the small pastern bone (os corona), and the navicular bone(osna- 

 vicularis), with the tendon of the flexor pedis, which passes over 

 the navicular, bone, and is inserted in the sole of the coffin-bone, a vari- 

 ety of illustrations of which I give. The surface of the coffin-bone 

 is covered by laminae or thin plates, running from above downward, 

 fitting into corresponding plates on the inner surface of the hoof. 

 The sole is also covered by a sensitive structure which is villous, 

 thai; is, presenting elevations and depressions, which fit into recipro- 

 cal horny villi on the sole of the foot. At the back part of the 

 sole we have the sensitive or fatty frog, covered in a similar manner 

 by the horny frog. These, with the coronary ligament (which occu- 

 pies the groove in the upper margin of the wall of the hoof, and 

 frpm which the hoof grows), and the coronary frog-band, blood-ves- 

 sels, nerves, and lymphatics, constitute the foot of the horse. (To 

 make this more plain, I include drawings of different views of the 

 hoof; reference can also be made to (illustrations in " Shoeing.") 



Accidents and injuries of the foot constitute the principal 

 bruises, — stepping on stones, sharp bodies, treads, etc., and are also 

 causes of lameness. It is liable to injury from various causes, as oc- 

 casionally participating in constitutional derangement; but by far 

 the greatest amount of injury arises, directly or indirectly, from 

 shoeing. 



Sometimes, from carelessness, a nail penetrates the sensitive 

 part of the foot'(usually called the quick). Sometimes the nail itself 

 does not penetrate, but is driven so close as to cause the wall, in its 

 Course, to press on and bruise the quick, (something like Fig. 843,) 

 giving rise to inflammation, and usually terminating in suppuration. 



Serious trouble is also liable to be caused by driving the nails 

 deep and clinching them tightly, as this will bend the nails more or 

 less inward upon the soft parts, causing a binding, uncomfortable 

 (689) ' 



