2 
LAMENESS IN HORSES. 
erroneous site attached to it, one might pass it for being intended 
for curb, the “ cleaving of it through the middle” being very signi- 
ficant of the shape of the tumour. At all events, our old authors 
on farriery, succeeding Solleysel, appear to have done so ; and in 
this way we may account for the introduction of the word into our 
nomenclature. 
A Curb may be DEFINED to be, a prominence upon the back 
of the hind leg, a little below the hock, of a curvilinear shape, 
running in a direct line downwards, and consisting in effusion into 
or thickening of the sheath of the flexor tendons. 
The SIGNS of Curb, then, are a tumour in the situation men- 
tioned, possessing heat and tenderness while recent, and which are 
sometimes manifest in the surrounding skin as well, commonly 
attended with lameness, and, when the pain is great, with a flexed 
position of the limb in standing, the animal resting the weight upon 
his toe. 
Situation and Dimension. — The tumour, or prominence 
rather, rising imperceptibly out of the surface at a distance of from 
three to four inches below the point of the hock, gradually increases 
to the extent of one-and-a-half or two inches, and from its middle 
or most prominent part as gradually decreases, vanishing in the 
surface of the skin in the same manner in which it took its rise. 
This gradual rise and decline of the tumour renders it necessary, 
in order 
To DETECT A Curb, that the observer should stand alongside 
of the horse’s quarter, and not behind him. The eye in this posi- 
tion, running from the point of the hock downward, readily discovers 
the irregularity or prominence in the posterior line of the limb ; 
whereas, had the view been taken from behind, no swelling would 
have become visible. 
Magnitude. — Although the tumour of curb is never seen of 
any enormous size, yet is there a good deal of variation in its 
magnitude in different subjects. In some, in young unbroke 
horses in particular, the rising is too small to be likely to be de- 
tected by any save the practised eye, and, as such, is rarely ac- 
counted of any consequence ; unless it should happen to be com- 
bined with what we denominate “ a curby-formed hock.” On the 
other hand, every now and then, the tumours are so prominent and 
conspicuous that they cause great disfigurement, and are apt very 
much to depreciate the value of the animal. 
The Nature of Curb has certainly been but imperfectly 
understood, or we should never have had such 
Vague and varying Accounts of the disease. The funniest 
interpretation of a curb on record is, perhaps, that narrated by the 
late Professor Coleman, who learnt it at a horse cause on which 
