428 DISEASES OF THE HORSE. 
If the coffin joint has been penetrated, either by the offending 
instrument or by the process of suppuration, acute inflammation of 
the joint follows, accompanied with high fever, loss of appetite, etc. 
The ankle and coronet are now greatly swollen, and dropsy of the 
leg to the knee or hock, or even to the body, often follows. If the 
process of suppuration continues, small abscesses appear at intervals 
on different parts of the coronet, the patient rapidly loses flesh, and 
may die from intense suffering and blood poisoning. In other cases 
the suppuration soon disappears, and recovery is effected by the 
joint becoming stiff (anchylosis). 
When the wound is forward, near the toe, and deep enough to 
injure the coffin bone, caries always results. The presence of the 
dead pieces of bone can be determined by the use of the probe; the 
bone feels rough and gritty. Furthermore, there is no disposition 
upon the part of the wound to heal. 
Besides the complications above mentioned, others equally as seri- 
ous may be met with. The tendons may soften and rupture, the hoof 
may slough off, quittors develop, or sidebones and ringbones grow. 
Finally, laminatis of the opposite foot may happen if the patient 
persists in standing, or-lockjaw may cause early death. 
Treatment.—In all cases the horn around the seat of injury should 
be thinned down, a free opening made for the escape of the products 
of suppuration, and the foot placed in a poultice. If the injury is 
not serious, recovery takes place in a few days. When the wound 
is deeper it is better to put the foot into a cold bath or under a 
stream of cold water, as advised in the treatment for quittor. 
If the bone is injured, cold baths, containing about % ounces each 
of sulphate of copper and sulphate of iron, may be used until the 
dead bone is well softened, when it should be removed by an opera- 
tion. The animal must be cast for this operation. The sole is pared 
away until the diseased bone is exposed, when all the dead particles 
are to be removed with a drawing knife, and the wound dressed with 
3 per cent compound cresol solution or a 5 per cent solution of car- 
bolic acid, oakum balls, and a roller bandage. 
Wounds of the bone which are made by a blunt-pointed instrument, 
like the square-pointed cut nail, in which a portion of the surface is 
driven into the deeper parts of the bone, always progress slowly, and 
should be operated upon as soon as the conditions are favorable. 
Even wounds of the navicular bone, accompanied with caries, may be 
operated on and the life of the patient saved; but the most skillful 
surgery is required and only the experienced operator should under- 
take their treatment. 
Tf there is an escape of pure-synovial fluid from a wound of the 
sole, without injury to the bone, a small pencil of corrosive-sublimate 
