362 
SPAVIN. 
“ When the disease is hereditary* , it is in vain to attempt the cure 
by any method than by giving the fire.” Again: “No person 
can promise a certain cure in this case, or to make a horse sound 
that is troubled with spavin, by giving the fire ; though there is 
no other effectual remedy t.” From his quotation, we learn that 
Solleysell not only was fully acquainted with the potent efficacy of 
firing, but that in recommending it he was likewise aware how 
often, in cases of confirmed or inveterate spavin, we had to lament 
its inefficacy. 
Gibson’s Account of the Treatment of Spavin is really so 
admirable that I question whether a better stands on record : the 
perusal of it makes one almost blush for shame, feeling, as we must 
do, that it comprises nearly all we know, or at least practise, in 
the matter, in these boasted days of discovery and improvement. 
“ The usual method,” wrote Gibson, “ of curing bone spavin is by 
blisters and firing, without regard to the situation or cause from 
whence it proceeds. If a fulness on the fore part of the hock 
comes from hard riding, or any other violence, threatening spavin, 
coolers and repellents only are proper.” — “ Spavins that happen to 
colts and young horses, are generally external and superficial, and 
may be cured with milder applications than what are commonly 
made use of for their removal, and with less danger of breeding 
callosities in the joints ; for it is better to wear out these maladies 
by degrees , than to strive to conquer them all at once.” 
Gibson, with great good sense, objects to caustic blisters, which, 
“ for the most part, leave a continual baldness, and often a remaining 
stiffness, which can never be removed,” and recommends a vesicatory 
of a milder description in combination with terebinthinate mercurial 
ointment, which, <6 prove effectual, “ must be often repeated, and 
so requires a good deal of time before the cure is complete and 
perfect.” When a horse goes lame some time before a spavin 
shews itself, and at length a spavin is discovered “ deeply situated 
and extremely hard,” having its situation “ among the sinuosities% 
of the joint,” the usual practice is “ to fire immediately, and to use 
the strongest caustic blisters, and sometimes to fire and lay the 
blister immediately over the part.” I would, however, “ first of 
all choose to try a more gentle method, because horses are often 
worse after the use of forcible means to remove spavins than they 
were before .” — “ And, therefore, if the owner can be persuaded to 
allow a sufficient time , the best and safest way is to make trial of 
some mild caustic or blister.” — “ However, some spavins lie so 
deep, and run so far into the hollow of thejoint% , that no applications 
* The hereditariness of spavin was discussed at p. 123. 
f Compleat Horseman, Part II, chap, cv, page 281-2. 
| These expressions are of a nature to induce one to believe Gibson had 
seen disease within as well as without the joint. 
