PBACTUEES. 235 



nutritive gruels selected for his sustenance, until the consoHdation 

 is sufficiently advanced to permit the ingestion of food of a more 

 solid consistency. The callus wiLL usually be sufficiently hardened 

 in two or three weeks to allow of a change of diet to mashes of 

 cut hay and scalded grain, until the removal of the dressing re- 

 stores him to his old habit of mastication. 



Fractures of vertehroe. — These are not very common, but when 

 they do occur the bones most frequently injured are those of the 

 back and loins. The ordinary causes of fracture are responsible 

 here as elsewhere, such as heavy blows on the sx^inal column, severe 

 falls while conveying heavy loads, and especially violent efforts in 

 resisting the process of castiag. Although occurring more or less 

 frequently under the latter circumstances, the accident is not always 

 attributable to carelessness or error ia the management. It may, 

 of course, sometimes result from such a cause as a badly prepared 

 bed, or the accidental presence of a hard body concealed iu the 

 straw, or to a heavy fall when the movements of the patient have 

 not been sufficiently controlled by an effective apparatus and its 

 skillful adaptation, but it is quite as likely to be caused by the 

 violent resistance and the consequent powerful muscular contrac- 

 tion by the frightened patient. The sim- 

 ple fact of the overarching of the vertebral 

 column, with excessive pressure against 

 it from the intestinal mass, owing to the 

 spasmodic action of the abdominal mus- 

 cles, may account for it, and so also may 

 the struggles of the animal to escape from 

 the restraint of the hobbles while frantic 

 under the pain of an operation without 

 anaesthesia. In these cases the fracture 

 usually occurs in the body or the annular 

 part, or both, of the posterior dorsal or 

 FiG.260.-Fra^tur6oftheBody the anterior lumbar vertebra. When the 

 of a Dorsal Vertebra. tranverse processes of the last-named 

 bones are injured, it is probably in consequence of heavy concus- 

 sion incident to sti-iking the ground when cast. Diagnosis of a 

 fracture of the body of a vertebra is not always easy, especiaUy 

 when quite recent, and more especiaUy when there is no accom- 

 panying displacement. There are certain pecuUar signs accom- 

 panying the occurrence of the accident whHe an operation is in 



