594 ROYAL CGLLEGE OF VETERINARY SURGEONS. 
ing subject, and I cannot conceive why it has lain so long dormant. 
It is a lameness more frequent than is generally supposed. I have 
had similar cases many years ago. It is a lameness sometimes 
difficult to detect, inasmuch as we have no other symptom for our 
guidance than an inability to flex the joint : at other times we 
have, in addition to this symptom, heat, pain, and swelling. The 
most successful treatment is opening the vein immediately below 
the knee, and abstracting large quantities of blood therefrom — cold 
applications, physic, and rest. Should there be a permanent enlarge- 
ment, and the lameness continue, I fire, and, occasionally, a second 
time, with an astonishingly good effect. I know two or three horses 
at work now that I fired many years since for lamenesses in the knee 
joint : they are perfectly upright, but the joints are a little enlarged. 
We sometimes meet with constitutional diseases of the knee-joints 
in horses and cows, which invariably end in anchylosis. I have 
by me a beautiful preparation of an anchylosed knee-joint of a cow, 
evidently constitutional, as I was an eye-witness to the disease in 
all its stages. 
I am, Gentlemen, 
Your obedient servant, 
Jno. Tombs. 
P.S. — These are my sentiments, Messrs. Editors; but pray ex- 
cuse the hasty manner in which they are jumbled together. — J. T. 
The report of this month of the proceedings of Council is short, 
but it is full of interest. The Councillors are unremitting in their 
work, and they are doing it bravely ; and, therefore, it behoves 
all who have their profession at heart to lend their aid in every 
way in their power. The correspondence going on with the Hon. 
Mr. Mark Phillips, cannot fail of bringing things to an issue in 
that quarter. What the Home Secretary’s sentiments or opinions 
may be, we have little means of learning ; all we pretend to 
know about the matter is, that, standing upon the broad legal 
basis our Charter does, and upheld as it is by the BODY of the 
veterinary profession, no authority could, with any sort of colour- 
ing or justice, presume to alter or interfere with it. The schools 
may petition for, and may obtain, exclusive charters for them- 
