384 NAVICULAR DISEASE. 
beneficially upon a remote joint. Objection is taken to the feet standing 
in clay, because the cold produced by evaporation is disposed to drive 
blood from the parts, which already have too little. 
In extreme cases, neurotomy, or division of the nerve, is the only 
resort. For a detailed account of that operation the reader is referred 
to the next chapter. It permits the horse to be of some service to the 
master, and allows the animal an escape from the agonies of a cruel dis- 
ease; it is, however, not final. It conceals the lameness; it rarely cures 
the disorder. The internal ravages may still go on; and, though the 
nerve of the leg has been properly divided, yet at an uncertain period 
nerves generally reunite, and the part which was deprived of sensation 
may become once more sensitive to pain. Moreover, no eye can look 
upon the internal ravage. Sensation destroyed in a foot tempts the 
horse to throw even more than its proportion of weight on a part weak- 
ened by disease. The bone has fractured, or the tendon has ruptured, 
under too sudden a test of their integrity. 
For the above reasons, neurotomy is always most successful when 
early performed. In the primary state of the disorder, a restoration 
of the foot to its healthy functions has seemed to banish the affection. 
Pressure being given to the neurotomized organ, health has occasion- 
ally returned; and when the time has arrived for the reunion of the 
nerve, that event has been signalized by no reappearance of lameness. 
But when the disorder has continued so long as to weaken the struc- 
tures of the foot, operation is always attended with hazard. The nerve 
may be properly divided; the operation shall be admirably performed ; 
still the parts, weakened by the joint actions of active disease and of 
long rest, have become disorganized. Pressure being suddenly restored, 
the debilitated structures could not sustain the restoration of that burden 
they were originally formed to endure. Rupture or fracture was the 
result; and the veterinary surgeon, despite his admirable talent, is dis- 
graced by being obliged to order the immediate destruction of that 
animal which it was intended he should have benefited. 
For the above reasons, and because the sound member is always dis- 
posed to exhibit the disorder which incapacitates one foot, never delay 
adopting the only chance of certain relief. If from pecuniary motives, 
or from better but mistaken feelings, the proprietor hesitates to subject 
his dumb companion to the surgeon’s knife, never afterward should he 
repent of such a resolve. With delay the opportunity of benefit has 
passed ; the operation, to be successful, should be resorted to upon the 
second appearance of acute and decided lameness. 
