138 
REPORTS MADE TO THE 
Memoir I. 
This first memoir, in which the author recommends a perfectly 
new mode of treatment of certain lamenesses of the horse, hitherto 
deemed incurable, appeared to deserve every attention that we 
could bestow on it. We also thought that, in order to arrive at 
a fair and just conclusion, it was indispensable that we should 
procure certain horses labouring under this species of lameness, 
and put his plan of treatment to the test. This, however, com¬ 
pelled us to defer the presentation of our report during some 
months. We hope that you will appreciate our motive, and' 
pardon the delay*. 
Horses that are employed in quick and hard work, in large 
towns, often become seriously lame, and that lameness proves to 
be incurable. The diagnosis in these cases is generally suffi¬ 
ciently easy, when the cause of the lameness can be detected : 
but this cannot always be done ; and in a great number of cases 
there is much difficulty in determining both the seat and the 
nature of the lameness, and, consequently, the treatment which 
must be employed in order to accomplish a cure. In these em¬ 
barrassing circumstances, and which, unfortunately, so frequently 
occur, the veterinary surgeon first assures himself of the state of 
the foot, and if he finds no heat or tenderness about it, if the 
inferior and middle portions of the limb offer no shrinking point, 
—as there can be no effect without its adequate cause—he is 
led, and wdth much appearance of reason, to conclude that the 
seat of the lameness is in the upper portion of the ailing limb. 
When, however, he has arrived at that conclusion, he has yet to 
find out what is the nature of the disease, and whether it is the 
result of a violent sprain, or the consequence of rheumatic affec¬ 
tion—whether it has its seat in the ligamentous apparatus, or in 
the muscles which surround and strengthen the articulations. 
Deprived of many indications of disease which the human patient 
would present—often led into error by those who attend to the 
animals, and whose interest it may seem to be to conceal 
the accidents that have occurred, it is easy to conceive how 
often the veterinary surgeon may be embarrassed or misled. 
Guided only by insufficient and delusive symptoms, he combats 
the disease by repose, by local bleedings, by emollients, and by 
discutients. If the lameness continues, and there is yet no 
tender or inflamed spot to which he can satisfactorily trace the 
^ Notwithstanding’ this delay, the reports were ready in the month of 
March; but M. Bouley was not called upon to read them until the 7th of 
November. 
