365 
ANATOMY OF THE HORSE. 
tion from the other; for if, in a foot in a putrid condition, we 
attempt to part them by force, we may make an artificial rent 
somewhere, but can find no natural separation between them. 
The cuticular covering of the coronary substance having descend¬ 
ed upon the coffin-bone, the circumference of which is less than 
that of the coronet, becomes thereupon gathered into numerous 
little plaits or folds, which proceed in parallel slanting lines down 
the wall of the bone : a transformation it may be difficult to ex¬ 
plain, since the laminse unfolded would occupy a much larger 
surface than the coronet; at the same time, it is one that has its 
parallels in the animal constitution, and a remarkable one in the 
instance of the ciliary processes. 
Division. —According to this mode of derivation, every lamina 
consists of one entire plait or duplication of substance, having 
its inward sides intimately and inseparably united; its outward 
sides being the surfaces of attachment for the horny laminae. It 
has also two borders; one opposed to the coffin-bone, the other 
to the hoof: and two ends or extremities , one issuing out of the 
coronary substance, the other vanishing in the sensitive sole. 
Structure. —The substance of the laminae when held to the 
light evinces a degree of transparency; although its nature is 
extremely dense, and it possesses extraordinary toughness and 
tenacity. Veterinary writers and lecturers endowed the laminae 
with a high degree of elasticity : but it appears to me that the 
property is referrible to their connexions, and not one that is in¬ 
herent in their own substance. 
Elastic Structure. —This is a substratum of a fibrous perios¬ 
teum-like texture, attaching the laminae to the coffin-bone, in 
which it is that the property of elasticity resides to that remark¬ 
able extent usually ascribed to the laminae themselves : indeed, 
so elastic is it found to be, that it can be made to stretch and 
recede the same as a piece of Indian rubber. Its fibres take a 
direction downward and backward. At the same time it affords 
a commodious bed for the ramification of bloodvessels issuing 
from the substance of the bone, in which they are (particularly 
in the stretched condition of the substance) protected from in¬ 
jurious compression and consequent interruption to their circula¬ 
tion. 
Number. —In round numbers we may estimate the laminse at 
about 500; not including those of the bars. They vary, how¬ 
ever, in number: I have reckoned upwards of 600. 
Dimensions. —In length they decrease from around the toe 
towards the sides and heels in a corresponding ratio with the 
wall: those in front, the longest, being rather more than two 
inches in extent; the shortest, those at the heels, being rather 
