ON DISEASE OF THE HOCK JOINT. 
37(5 
Friend and Le Clerc, is remarkable. But, perhaps, the most 
extraordinary of all is the definition of dracunculus given by 
Turton in his Medical Glossary, — “ A worm in Guinea, so called, 
because it is supposed to be poisonous. ” It seems highly proba- 
ble that the illiterate natives of those countries in which dracun- 
culus has been endemic were the first to ascertain its animality; 
and that, according to their unsophisticated perceptions of its 
nature, the site of the sensation the animal communicated, or the 
tradition of some deeply impressed evil, gave corresponding de- 
nominations to it. Thus it is a current notion among the natives 
of Carthagena, that when the dracunculus has, from want of care 
in the beginning, completed the circle, and, according to them, 
joined its head and its tail, the disease generally proves fatal. 
They firmly believe it to be a little snake, and hence call it 
cobrilla. ( Ulloa , vol. i, p. 47.) Thus the natives of Guinea call 
it gnaason d'affo — il a mal au pied. ( Chev. de Marchais Voy. d 
Gurnee , tom. ii, p. 136.) The natives of Africa which I have 
spoken to on the subject give it names bearing the same im- 
port : — the Kambas, gnaalfou ; the Corotnantees, affang, and 
emvamie. Thus, too, the Arabians and Egyptians assign its 
origin to the hardships inflicted by the Pharaohs of Egypt, and 
call it tarenteel , or the worm of Pharaoh ; all bad things by the 
Arabs being attributed to these poor kings, who seem to be 
looked upon by posterity as the evil genii of the country which 
they once governed. {Bruce's Travels , vol. iii, p. 37, 4to.) 
[To be continued.] 
ON DISEASE OF THE HOCK JOINT, AS OFTEN 
REFERRIBLE TO THE TIBIA AND THE ASTRA- 
GALUS. 
By Mr. W. C. Spooner, Southampton. 
Some time since a horse that I had known for two or three 
years died of complicated abdominal and thoracic disease. He 
had during this time been worked very lightly, and had mani- 
fested a peculiar way of going on both hind legs, and sometimes 
appeared a little lame in one of them. Suspecting mischief in 
the hocks, I procured the joints, and discovered a greater lesion 
than I even anticipated on the middle convexity of the tibia, and 
the corresponding depression in the astragalus. The ulceration 
on the former bone was at least 3-4ths of an inch in length, and 
nearly half an inch in width. The cartilage and periosteum were 
entirely removed on this abraded surface, and both hocks pre- 
sented nearly the same appearance, which circumstance, no 
