THE 
VETERINARIAN. 
VOL. XXI, 
No. 251. 
NOVEMBER 1848. 
Third Series, 
No. 11. 
LAMENESS IN HORSES. 
By William Percivall, M.R.C.S. and V.S. 
[Continued from page 484.] 
Diseases of the Bursae Mucosa and Synovial Sheaths. 
No person having any pretension to anatomical knowledge need 
be told that the parts named, or rather misnamed, by the old ana- 
tomists BURSiE MUCOSAE, are not bags of mucus, but bags con- 
taining a fluid similar in its aspect and properties to synovia, or 
joint oil; and that the sheaths of tendons, “ the synovial sheaths” 
as they are usually called, are kindred structures to them. The 
bursa mucosa consists simply of a membrane, of the same texture 
as synovial membrane, thrown into the form of a sac or bag. The 
synovial sheath nothing differs from it save that the membranous 
sac is commonly prolonged and enlarged, and is apt to run into 
divers complex and irregular shapes. Both bursa and sheath form 
circumscribed inclosures ; and in this respect both bear considera- 
ble analogy, as well as in the texture of their membranous walls, 
to the shut cavities of the joints. Dr. Alexander Munro* satis- 
factorily established the identity in structure, sensibility, and dis- 
ease, between the bursae and the capsular ligaments of joints. He 
found the membrane composing one and the other thin and dense, 
and possessing little sensibility in disease, but great sensibility in 
a state of inflammation ; and that, though transparent in the bursa, 
it was as capable as the capsular ligament of confining air or any 
other fluid. That the cavity of the bursa should be shut, the same 
as that of the joint, and secluded through the density of its parietes 
from all around, appears requisite, not merely that it may retain 
the fluid secreted into it, but that no other fluid, not even air, may 
* In that section of his works entituled, “ A Description of all the Bursae 
Mucosae of the Human Body.” Edinburgh , 1785. 
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