NEUROTOMY. 
61 
to it at an improper time. It is therefore a duty the operator owes 
to himself, ^s well as to his employer, to ascertain the fitness in 
all respects of the animal brought to him for operation ; nor should 
he suffer himself to be prevailed upon to undertake it, unless in 
his own mind this fitness both of subject and disease be clearly 
made out. It is the swerving from this plain rule of direction which 
has too often brought both operation and operator into disrepute. 
The incurably LAME Horse is the especial subject for neu- 
rotomy, and, above all other descriptions of lameness, that arising 
from chronic and permanent and irremediable navicularthritic dis- 
ease is that which holds out the best promise of success from the 
performance of such an operation. But a horse may be lame from 
this cause in one foot, or in both feet. So long as lameness is confined 
to one foot, though that lameness be severe and unrelievable, still 
may the animal be able to perform a certain amount or kind of work ; 
and whether it be advisable or not to neurotomize such a horse — 
supposing he be fitted in other respects for the operation — is a 
question that will best be determined by consulting with his master 
as to the amount or kind of work he is still able to undergo, and 
the pain he appears to suffer in undergoing it, or in the stable after 
his work is done. A humane master will feel for the pain his ser- 
vant experiences not only at work but during rest ; nor will he 
hesitate to submit his horse, under such circumstances, to neuro- 
tomy, although the division of the nerve be, for a moment — but 
only for a moment — exquisitely more painful than the lameness 
itself. 
With a horse, however, lame from the consequences of navicu- 
larthritic disease in both (fore) feet — confirmedly groggy , as the 
phrase goes— the choice does not lie between still able to work 
and neurotomy, but between neurotomy and the slaughter-house ; 
for the inveterate groggy horse is absolutely worth for work next 
to nothing, while the pain many such poor beasts unremittingly 
endure wears them down in condition to that degree that their con- 
stitution gives way as well as their legs and feet. And, therefore, I 
repeat, nothing can save such horses from slaughter but the hand of 
the neurotomist ; nor will that avail them at such times as other 
grave morbific changes have supervened upon those in the navicu- 
lar joint, or where age has added decrepitude to lameness. 
In neither case — neither in one nor both navicularthritic feet — • 
will the judicious veterinary practitioner operate at a time when 
inflammatory action is detectible in the feet. It is a rule with 
surgeons, never, if it be possible to avoid so doing, to cut into an 
inflamed part ; and veterinary surgeons should make it their rule, 
in the performance of neurotomy, to postpone the operation when 
inflammation is present, until such time as, by suitable means, such 
