THE 
VETERINARIAN. 
VOL. XXIV, 
No. 281. 
MAY 1851. 
Third Series, 
No. 41. 
LAMENESS IN HORSES. 
By William Perciyall, M.R.C.S. and V.S. 
[Continued from page 70.] 
Canker. 
CANKER , in the sense in which we make use of the word 
in veterinary medicine, may be said to be synonymous with 
cancer in human medicine : the latter being the Latin name for 
a crab, an ill-favoured animal the disease in certain forms was 
supposed to represent. For the same reason, cancer is sometimes 
called lupus or wolf. The French have named what we ex- 
press by canker, crapaud or toad, seemingly from some such 
fanciful comparison*. 
Definition. — Canker is a disease of the secreting tissues of 
the foot, affecting in particular the sensitive frog and sole, and 
essentially consisting in the production of a peculiar morbid 
substance called fungus. 
The History of Canker, in our own country, while it 
affords most satisfactory results in regard to the contrasted pre- 
valence and destructiveness of the disease in times past and in 
times present, opens to us a book of instruction out of which we 
may learn both how to prevent and to cure it. In former days 
it was no unusual thing for canker to prevail in large establish- 
ments of horses in an epidemic and even a malignant form. 
In the army the disease was known to create year after year 
sad defalcations ; nor were these remedied until the introduc- 
tion of veterinary surgeons into the several regiments and public 
departments. 1 have heard both the late Professor Coleman 
and my father (who was the senior veterinary surgeon of the 
Artillery) say, that, towards the close of the last century and 
* Might not canker derive its application to this fungous disease from the 
meaning attached to the word in Gloucestershire, viz. its signifying “ a poison- 
ous fungus resembling a mushroom” ? 
VOL. XXIV. L 1 
