ae 137 
The predisposing causes of laminitis are :—working animals when out of 
condition, fast trotting on hard roads, and inherited tendency. Allowing 
horses to drink cold water when heated, and keeping them in a standing 
posture for a long time on board ship or in slings, are also causes of this painful 
disease. Mares in foal are often afflicted with a mild subacute attack of 
laminitis. An overdose of aloes has been known to cause laminitis ; and this 
disease, according to Percivall, may in some seasons become epidemic. We 
have, however, never known of its becoming epidemic. Finally, we may add 
that barley, wheat, and Indian corn often cause acute inflammation of the feet. 
Removing animals suddenly from grass, and then overfeeding them in 
the stable, is a common cause of the acute form, more especially when the 
animal is suddenly called upon to perform work. A good instance of this 
we met with a short time ago. A horse belonging to a carter escaped in the 
night, and made his way toa bin of powdered Indian corn, of which he 
devoured over two stones. The owner next morning drove him from Louth 
to Grimsby and back, a distance of about twenty-eight miles. The 
following day the horse was struck down with acute laminitis. We were 
called in when the horse had already been ill about fourteen days, and 
found the coffin bones in a state of osseous mortification, or necrosis. The 
animal was accordingly ordered to be shot. 
There are few diseases of which such erroneous views are generally 
held, and contrary to the general impression, there are few which are so 
amenable to early, judicious, and careful treatment, as is laminitis. If 
treated properly in the early stages, cases of inflammation of the feet will 
very often completely recover. It may be stated most emphatically, that the 
earlier they are attended to, the better is the chance of ultimate cure. 
A short time ago I was requested by a large land-owner to examine a 
valuable cart-horse which was being treated for ringbones. The animal was 
trotted once down the yard. “Your horse,” I observed, “is suffering from 
chronic laminitis, and must be treated accordingly.” Here was a valuable 
animal, worth ninety pounds or more, well nigh wrecked, and now scarcely 
worth fifteen pounds, simply because the owner had been misled as to the 
nature of the disease. Such a case was one which would have been 
pre-eminently curable in the early stages. In the later ones, when the 
malady had become chronic, the disease proved much more refractory. 
This animal made a good recovery eventually, but at a far greater amount 
of trouble and expense, than would have been necessary, if the case had been 
attended to properly in the first instance. 
In treating acute laminitis, it is our practice to administer three or four 
drachms of aloes in the first instance, or one pint of linseed oil. We do not, 
of course, administer any purgative if the bowels are already too freely 
opened. The diet should be laxative, consisting of bran mashes and linseed 
cake gruel. The shoes should be removed, but it is not desirable to pare 
away any of the horn. Internally a drench, composed of five drops of 
Fleming’s tincture of aconite, one ounce of bicarbonate of potassium, and four 
ounces of liquor ammonii acetatis, may be given every four hours for four 
