LAMENESS IN HORSES. 
545 
which they are attached as well, which not infrequently runs 
into a state of caries, ending in defalcation of substance, to be 
filled up by the effusion of callus, which usually terminates in 
exostosis, coated with some tissue very imperfectly representing 
the original laminated structure. 
Mr. Braby, the intelligent veterinary surgeon to Messrs. 
Barclay and Perkins’ establishment, to whom I am indebted 
for much of the information I possess on this part of my sub- 
ject, has had many cases of this description, one of which, of 
extraordinary character, I shall relate here. One of his dray 
horses had suffered long and severely from toe sandcrack in one 
hind foot, but at length had recovered, and returned to work. 
Some time afterwards, however, during the season of influenza, 
he was attacked with a violent laryngitis, which increased to a 
degree to call for the operation of tracheotomy, to save him 
from suffocation. Notwithstanding this temporary salvation, 
however, the patient in the end succumbed to the disease. 
His post-mortem examination became doubly attractive, owing 
to the circumstance of the long-standing and obstinate sandcrack 
he had suffered from heretofore, and the result in this latter 
respect proved extremely interesting. The coffin-bone, along 
its front, occupying the line of surface between the coronal 
process and the toe, exhibited a channel of loss of substance 
half an inch in breadth and fully the same in depth, thereby 
robbing it of a quarter of an inch of its solid diameter. This, of 
course, left the bone considerably weakened, the result of which 
subsequently was, transverse fracture in two places through its 
body: the fractures commencing upon its articulatory surface, 
whence they extended directly crosswise through the middle of 
its body, so as to become apparent upon its concave surface under- 
neath. In addition to this, growing from the laminated interior 
of the wall of the hoof, opposite to the middle or deepest part 
of the channel in the coffin-bone, is a projection of hard, horny, 
callous substance, having a covering of imperfectly formed 
horny lamina?. At the time this horse was suffering in the 
greatest degree from this extraordinary product of sandcrack; 
indeed, constitutional irritation ran so high as even to create 
alarm for the animal’s life. 
The Treatment of Sandcrack, whether it be in the 
quarter or in the toe, will have to be conducted upon principles 
applicable to both forms of the disease; though one must be re- 
garded as of much more consequence than the other. 
The Treatment of a Quarter Sandcrack, generally 
speaking, is but, comparatively, a simple affair; indeed, so 
lightly is it looked upon by horse persons in general, that we 
should run some risk of their displeasure, and our own repu- 
