36 
GEORGE C. FAVILLE. 
nothing to do with the cause of osteoporosis directly. Food 
may possibly become a factor, the result of conditions; but 
deficiency of lime salts in water or food does not produce the 
disease as I find it. The food may be perfect in every re¬ 
spect, but as the disease is one seriously affecting the func¬ 
tions of nutrition and assimilation, the lime salts which the 
food naturally contains are not properly appropriated. 
Either directly or indirectly the result of the inflammatory 
action going on in the bones, the lime salts they contain are 
converted into soluble salts and re-absorbed, leaving the 
affected bones in the condition we find them. I am aware 
that this is a variation of the acid theory, but, to my mind, it 
accounts for the characteristic phenomena. 
I do not give phosphate of lime solely for the purpose of 
furnishing lime salt to the bones; I give it to correct the 
mal-nutrition of the bones, as well as all the fluids and tissues 
of the body, of which it is essentially a normal constituent. 
In all my experience osteoporosis is confined to the horse ; 1 
have never diagnosed a case in any other animal. 
It is by no means a disease of the poor man’s stable. The 
great majority of my cases were in stables where the animals 
had the benefit of all that money could procure in the form 
of first-class food. In one stable, which was a brick struc¬ 
ture, the horses’ stalls were in the rear, the stone-paved floor 
of which was from seven to fifteen feet below the grade of 
the alley. The brick wall against the earth was always wet, 
and, of course, the atmosphere in that part was moist. Nine 
horses in the stalls ranged along this brick wall developed 
the disease, but no case of the disease developed among the 
horses that stood in stalls on the opposite side of the stable, 
because the windows and doors on this side were exposed to 
the south, which assured plenty of sunlight, and as the out¬ 
side was lower than the inside, there was surface drainage ; 
and as this row of stalls was frequently exposed to a plenti¬ 
ful supply of outside air, ventilation occurred naturally to 
some extent. 
When I was called to examine an affected horse, I ex¬ 
pressed the opinion that the structure of the stable and want 
