648 UNION OF A FRACTURED FEMUR IN A COLT. 
arrangement into parallel ridges and furrows they, through 
this adherence, compel the fibres of the wall, and therefore 
the mass of the wall itself, to follow invariably in the direc- 
tion of these ridges and furrows during growth. As the wall 
and its laminae are incessantly growing from the coronary 
cushion downwards, and as the vascular laminae are fixtures, 
and do not extend beyond the lower border of the os pedis, 
it follows that the inner face of the wall must glide along the 
latter in its course from above to below, and that this move- 
ment could not take place were the vascular and horny 
laminae indissolubly united, instead of being connected 
merely by the soft unctuous horn-cells interposed between 
their inter digitations, and which act as a lubricant in this 
downward movement of the wall. 
These cells interposed between the horny and vascular 
leaves are in every respect analogous to the mucous or Mal- 
pighian layer of cells beneath the human nail, which also 
lies upon and passes over ridges that might aptly be com- 
pared to the laminae of the horse’s foot. 
(7b be continued.') 
UNION OF A FRACTURED FEMUR IN A COLT. 
By J. W. Hill, M.R.C.V.S., Wolverhampton. 
On October 19th, 1870, I was requested to attend at the 
residence of Edward Emery, Esq., Abbots Bromley, to 
examine a nearly thoroughbred colt, four months old, which 
I was informed by the messenger had either dislocated or frac- 
tured its thigh. Upon my arrival I found the case to be one 
of oblique fracture of the femur, a little below its centre. 
The accident occurred as follows: — The colt was at pas- 
ture with his dam, and Mr. Emery, in company with a man 
servant, went to fetch him up for the purpose of weaning him. 
To accomplish this object they haltered the young animal, 
and, as a natural consequence, he being unaccustomed to such 
a mode of restraint, reared and fell backwards, fracturing the 
bone in the fall. Possibly there was no separation at first, as 
after getting up the colt limped home, a distance of a mile. 
At the time, however, I examined the parts, a distinct sepa- 
ration between the fractured ends of the bone could be plainly 
felt. 
More to oblige the owner than from any hope of success, I 
set the fractured limb in the best way I could ; but from the 
