REVIEWS. 
455 
to deserve to have been placed in a separate book, or sort of 
atlas, apart. This might, in lying open before the reader, 
have saved a good deal of turning over, and so far trouble, on 
his part. However, we fancy we can guess at the objection 
to such a plan ; and therefore we will say no more about it. 
For this month, we will conclude with an extract on — 
THE ANATOMY AND PHYSIOLOGY OE THE EOOT. 
“ The foot of the horse presents a mechanism admirably adapted to the 
habits of the animal ; for in the horse that complexity of structure, exhibited 
in the numerous phalanges of other quadrupeds, is found united in one. Erom 
the various circumstances to which we subject this creature, such as keeping 
him in stables, riding him upon hard roads, and the attachment of iron 
shoes, the feet become peculiarly susceptible of disease. At birth, the horny 
parts of the feet are found less evolved than most other of the external 
organs; were they more perfected, their hard surfaces might injure the 
mother ; at this early period the pasterns are long and upright, and instead 
of the extremities ending, as in the adult, in a broad extended base, they are 
pointed in front, and present only the rudiments of a frog. The bones im- 
mediately belonging to the foot are two, the coffin and the navicular ; the 
little pastern, or coronary bone, which articulates with both, is also partly 
hidden within the hoof. The coffin bone corresponds in shape to the ante- 
rior part of the hoof ; in front it presents an eminence, to which the extensor 
pedis tendon is attached ; its sides stretched back into two lateral processes 
or wings, to the upper surface of which are fixed the lateral cartilages ; its 
superior surface presents two articular cavities, and its lower is vaulted, and 
to it is attached the perforans tendon ; while its exterior is covered by the 
sensitive laminae. It will be seen to be of a loose texture, with small bony 
ridges extending from above downwards, favouring the attachment of the 
sensitive laminae. The navicular bone , which in shape is supposed to re- 
semble a boat or shuttle, embeds itself between the wings of the coffin bone, 
to which it is attached. 
“ The small pastern bone , articulates with the coffin and with the navicular 
bones, to both of which it is united by the capsular and other ligaments. The 
lateral cartilages are externally convex, and internally slightly concave, their 
upper surface stretching superiorly beyond the confines of the hoof. The laminae 
are vascular and sensitive productions; possessed of that elasticity which belong 
to all living matter ; situated round the surface of the coffin bone, and be- 
tween every two lies their secretion in the shape of a horny laminae, which 
constitutes part of the inner wall of the hoof. The extensor pedis tendon 
passes in front of the os corona into the anterior eminence of the coffin, and 
the flexor perforans tendon affixes itself to the posterior of the bony sole. 
The elastic frog is situated next to this, on which, and on the flexor ten- 
don, the navicular bone rests. Tiie sensitive frog and sole lie under the 
coffin bone and elastic frog, the horny sole and frog covering them in- 
feriorly ; while the hoof generally covers the whole of the sensitive parts of 
the foot- 
“The hoof is a horny development, secreted from a continuation, although 
altered state of the cutis, exactly as the human nail is formed from that 
which is termed the quick: it is distinctly composed of fibres parallel with 
each other, and held together by a glutinous horny exudation which is re- 
moved, and the fibres separated by maceration. Inordinate heat and 
dryness will partially do the same in the living hoof, as we know by what 
