DURING THE SCHOLASTIC YEAR 1851 - 52 . 387 
the re-establishment of the function of the cut nerve by its 
continuity. It is, however, little admissible that the indurated 
knot constituting the cicatrix between the two divided 
nervous trunks, could ever become the conductor of the 
nervous stream : it is much more probable that the return 
of the lameness is referable to the progress of the disease 
which neurotomy has not been able to efface. The painful 
sensations which had ceased to be felt after the section of 
the cerebro-spinal nerves, in so much as the material lesions 
to which they corresponded were little developed, becoming 
exalted to a point to be transmissible through other roads, 
in proportion as the destruction of the tissues has made 
progress. 
Finally, when neurotomy is practised for the concealment 
of lameness, the product of navicular disease in its last stage, 
we must not expect other than results incomplete and of 
little duration, since, on the one part, the structural lesions 
accompanying the disease, in this extreme stage, are sufficient 
in themselves to offer mechanical obstacles to the regular 
play of the articular apparatus ; and because, on the other 
hand, the pain attendant on these lesions is of sufficient 
intensity to be transmitted to the centre of sensibility through 
other channels than the divided nervous chords. The results, 
however, are different when the operation is practised for 
navicular disease not as yet complicated with such organic 
alterations, and especially when it is confined to one limb. 
In this case, neurotomy may be regarded as a curative 
measure, if not in the absolute sense of the word, at least in 
its effects; since, through its influence, an animal unfitted 
for use from an obstinate lameness, may be set right in a 
moment, and become, together with his fitness for work, of 
a saleable value of some consideration. 
The practitioner about to operate for navicular disease 
confined to one foot, ought to give warning, as an event 
possible to happen, that the limb not operated on will in its 
turn take on, after a longer or shorter interval, lameness 
similar to that of the other, according as the animal shows 
signs of such by his gait and his attitudes. In fact, it is 
usual for navicularthrites to attack, though in different 
degrees, both feet at once. Before the operation, the horse 
will go lamer in one foot than in the other. But, after the 
operation has been performed, the operated limb becoming 
insensible, the pain in the other becomes prominent, and 
now manifests itself in all its intensity, and is expressed by 
proportionate lameness. Sometimes these effects become 
evident immediately after the operation; at other times at 
