273 
A CASE OF RUPTURE OF THE FLEXOR METATARSI. 
By Mr. W. A. Cartwright, V.S., Whitchurch. 
On the 21st of November, 1840, the Rev. R. Mayow, of this 
town, rode after the hounds a fine chestnut horse nearly 17 hands 
high. After a burst of twenty minutes, they came to a leap, where 
the horse’s hind legs slipped into a boggy ditch with his breast 
on the fence, and he thereby became staked in the breast, while 
his hind legs sunk in the ditch, and became fastened there. In 
a short time, however, the off hind leg was liberated, but the 
other he had very great difficulty in pulling out. 
When he came to the bank, it was found that some injury 
had taken place in the near hind leg. A farrier near Cholmon- 
deley was called in, who said he had ruptured some of the mus- 
cles on the hack of the haunch above the hock. 
The horse was brought home a distance of eight or nine miles. 
I saw him immediately after his arrival, and found him rather ex- 
hausted. I examined the breast, but found that no mortal injury 
had been inflicted. I then went to the hind extremity, and saw 
in a moment that there probably was a rupture of the flexor me- 
tatarsi muscle or its tendon, and most likely of the latter. 
The action of the limb indicated the loss of power of that 
muscle, as the leg could be bent at the hock completely straight 
behind, and he had no power of any importance before, in oppo- 
sition to those antagonist ones — the gastrocnemii — behind. In 
some of his movements the limb appeared quite loose about the 
hock, and was occasionally knocked against the other leg. On 
moving him about, there was a twitching up backwards of the 
leg at the hock, and when he walked forwards, it was evidently 
done without the concurrence of the flexor metatarsi. 
There was a soreness in front at about six inches above the 
hock, and also a little higher up, and the usual tenseness and 
distinctness of the tendon could not be seen. There was no ap- 
parent pain of any importance. 
Treatment . — In about two hours after he came home, I took 
four quarts of blood from him, gave some physic, and ordered 
fomentations. 
22 d . — I found him almost as lively as usual : — continue fo- 
mentations, and keep him quiet. 
2 5th . — From the last date to this we continued to foment and 
keep him quiet. The wound in his breast is going on satis- 
factorily, and no doubt will do well. I now blistered the front 
of the hock and thigh to keep him quiet, and put on a cross line 
VOL. XIV. N n 
