LAMENESS: ITS CAUSES AND TREATMENT. 341 



delay. The means of effecting this vary according to whether the 

 displacement is outward or inward. In the first case the bone may 

 be straightened by pressure from without, while in the second the 

 end of it must be raised by a lever, for the introduction of which a 

 small incision through the skin and intercostal spaces will be neces- 

 sarj'. When coaptation has been effected it must be retained by the 

 external application of an adhesive mixture, with splints and band- 

 ages around the chest. 



FRACTURES OF THE BONES OF THE PELVIS. 



These fractures will be considered under their separate denomina- 

 tions, as those of the sacrum and the os innominatum, or hip, which 

 includes the subdivisions of the ilium, the pubes, and the ischium. 



The sacrum. — Fractures of this bone' are rarely met with among 

 solipeds. Among cattle, however, it is of common occurrence, being 

 attributed not only to the usual varieties of violence, as blows and 

 other external hurts, but to the act of coition and violent efforts in 

 parturition. It is generally of the transverse kind and may be 

 recognized by the deformity which it occasions. This is due to the 

 dropping of the bone, with a change in its direction and a lower 

 attachment of the tail, which also becomes more or less paralyzed. 

 The natural and spontaneous relief which usually interposes in these 

 cases has doubtless been observed by the extensive cattle breeders of 

 the West, and their practice and example fully establish the inutility 

 of interference. Still, cases may occur in which reduction may be in- 

 dicated, and it then becomes a matter of no difficulty. It is effected by 

 the introduction of a round, smooth piece of wood into the rectiim 

 as far as the fragment of bone and using it as a lever, resting upon 

 another as a fulcrum placed under it outside. The bone, having 

 been thus returned, may be kept in place by the ordinary external 

 means in use. ' 



. The OS innom,inatum. — ^Fracture of the ilium may "be observed 

 either at the angle of the hip or at the neck of the bone ; those of the 

 pubes may take place at the symphysis, or in the body of the bone ; 

 those of the ischium on the floor of the bone, or at its posterior ex- 

 ternal angle. Or, again, the fracture may involve all three of these 

 constituent parts of the hip bone by having its situation in the articu- 

 lar cavity — the acetabulum by which it joins the femur or thigh bone. 



Symptoms. — Some of these fractures are easily recognized, while 

 others are difficult to identify. The ordinary deformity which char- 

 acterizes a fracture of the external angle of the ilium, its dropping 

 and the diminution of that side of the hip in width, unite in indicat- 

 ing the existence of the condition expressed by the term "hipped." 

 An incomplete fracture, however, or one that is complete without dis- 

 placement, or even one with displacement, often demands the closest 



