CAUTERY AND THE SETON. 
675 
the early part of my career I had imbibed, one of which was the 
superiority of the cautery over the seton. I had been brought up 
with the notion that, in all cases, the cautery was superior to the 
seton : but the reasonings of Mr. Sewell, supported as they 
were by the most successful practice, shook my faith in the old 
doctrine, and forced me to give a fair trial to the new one. Of this 
determination 1 have had no reason to repent, and I can now 
point to a long train of successful results from the use of the 
seton, especially in spavins. 
With a seton, you get below the skin, close to the ligamentous 
connexion of the bones of the hock, and as near to the seat of 
disease as you can go with common prudence or safety to the 
joint. With it, too, you can fora month or six weeks, or longer 
if necessary, keep up constant irritation, which in general pro- 
duces a great deal of inflammation. In three or four days, sup- 
puration occurs, after which the absorbents take the lead of the 
arteries ; the supply of blood is partly cut off from the hock ; and 
independently of the spavin becoming diminished in magnitude 
from the irritation produced, together with the secretion of pus, 
the chronic inflammation is subdued ; and in four or five weeks 
the patient is going well, and with scarcely any blemish. 
Some have recommended leather setons, others ribbon or the 
common unbleached tape ; but I find that the tape which answers 
best, is the strong, broad, rough, twilled tape, used by the 
bootmakers for making boot-loops. When the needle has fairly 
entered, it ought to be passed zigzag over the whole inner region 
of the hock, cutting up the whole cellular membrane right and 
left, connected with it, by which means more irritation is produced 
than if it were passed straightforward, and subsequently you 
have a more abundant discharge of matter. Before tying the 
second seton knot, the assistant must seize the one ; and while 
the operator holds fast the other, it is to be drawn twenty or 
thirty times as rapidly as possible up and down. The setons 
require to be dressed twice or thrice a-day, and the hocks to be 
well fomented, for if the setons are not kept clean, they will very 
soon slough ; and even should there be the least carelessness 
on the part of the dresser, the hair will fall off in the course of 
the seton. 
After the setons are withdrawn, and the sores healed up, it is 
my practice to rub into the seat of the spavin some camphorated 
mercurial ointment, which I find an excellent auxiliary. Last 
year I had about seventy-nine horses under treatment for spavins 
and splents below the knee, out of which number seventy became 
perfectly upright and useful, from setons. Some of them 
worked two weeks in the month, and got well. I have had 
