DURING THE SCHOLASTIC YEAR 1851-52. 389 
he will have reason to be satisfied of the happy results that 
follow. 
So, for example, we have had recourse to the operation, 
with great advantage, for the removal of lameness arising 
from quittor in cart-horses, and generally the good effects 
have been permanent. In ring-bone neurotomy has proved 
much less successful ; which may be readily understood, on 
account of the mechanical obstacles which the presence of 
ring-bone opposes to the free motion of the pastern joints. 
Section of the plantar nerves is specially indicated — 
1. In a case of contracted hoof of one or the other 
quarter, or both quarters together, providing the contraction 
be the sole cause of lameness, or that it is the effect only of 
some deeper-seated cause. 
2. In a case in which the foot has been crushed by a wheel, 
the foot remaining afterwards the seat of violent pain, either 
from the coffin-bone being deformed by periostosis around 
it, under the influence of the violence it has sustained, or 
that the inflamed podophyllous tissue has augmented the 
keraphyllous horn, and that, from one or other of these 
causes, the vascular and nervous tissues of the foot remain 
under the operation of constant constraint. 
We may, a-propos , quote here, as proof of the benefit to be 
derived from neurotomy, the case of a little mare de manege , 
who had the hoof of her right hind foot completely torn off 
by the wheel of a carriage, with comminution of the inferior 
border of the coffin-bone around its middle part. This beast 
possessed great value in the eyes of her proprietor, because, 
on account of her small size and her extreme docility, it 
served for his children to ride when they were taking lessons 
in equitation. It was very desirable, therefore, to restore it. 
Within ten months the hoof was completely replaced. But, 
at the expiration of so long a time, the results of the treat- 
ment employed appeared to have amounted to nothing ; for 
the mare halted almost upon three legs, owing to the ex- 
cessive straightness of the newly-formed hoof, as well as, 
probably, to the alterations in the coffin apparatus. Her 
owners, on this account, were going to get rid of her in the 
market at any price, when we recommended to make trial in 
the case of neurotomy. To this the proprietor consented. 
The operation was performed on the posterior branches 
alone of the nerves, save that the anterior branches were to 
be severed afterwards providing the section of the first proved 
insufficient. The result of the operation was such, that 15 
days afterwards the mare returned to her work, not only 
completely straight in the limb, but scarcely showing any 
