LAMENESS IN HORSES. 
421 
kind of splint. His description of them runs — simple splints, 
through long and violent exercise, “ mount (upwards) to the knee 
adding, “ some people maintain that a splint doth not mount 
upwards, but only burthens and extends itself to the knee, so that 
it thereby interrupts the motion of the leg ; but what way soever 
it come thither, it is certain that a splint joining to the knee 
lameth the horse.” The “ excrescence” upon the knee, Solleysell 
tells us, “ is called an osselet :” adding, that such “ grows upon the 
inner side of the knee, never upon the outer and that “ some 
horses have two of them, one upon each leg.” To splint or spavin, 
or by whatever name the disease may be called, in the form now 
under our consideration, there can be no doubt but that too little 
attention has been devoted by veterinary practitioners : we there- 
fore invite their observation to the subject, while we refer them 
for further information on it to an excellent article on “ Carpitis,” 
published by Mr. Arthur Cherry, in The Veterinarian, vol. xviii, 
p. 601-607. 
The Cause of Splint, now that its nature has been deve- 
loped, will on reflection strike us to consist in any thing that may 
occasion undue or sudden pressure upon the splint bone, whereby 
the fibro-cartilaginous union between it and the cannon bone is 
stretched or strained, and so has its capillary circulation increased 
in such manner or measure that conversion of it into bone is the 
result, followed or not by exostosis as the case may be. Over- 
weight or over-action at a tender age is the ordinary cause of this. 
In the anxiety there is to bring young horses into use, in the pre- 
cocious practice of breaking and racing and hunting that exists, 
we cannot feel surprised at unperfected parts giving way, or being 
re-constructed in a different manner from the original design. Nature 
is forced beyond her powers, and, finding that the soft and elastic 
material placed for a certain wise purpose between the splint and 
cannon bones insufficient against weight and force, osseous mate- 
rial is substituted for it. Even before breaking or using the colt 
commences, however, the mischief may be perpetrated. A gallop, 
a jump, a gambol in the field or the yard, may, even in the foal, 
occasion the throwing out of splint. Again, a blow or other ex- 
ternal injury may produce a splint, though this is comparatively a 
rare case. To whatsoever cause, however, it be referrible, the 
fact is notorious enough, that hardly any horse completes his 
fifth year without splint, either latent or demonstrable ; for, as 
we have before remarked, exostosis or tumour is not absolutely 
necessary to constitute splint. 
Splint is peculiar to the Fore Limb and to the inner 
Side OF it. — Not that splint never is seen upon the hind , or that 
the outer side of the limb does not on occasions shew splint ; but 
