514 
EXTRACTS FROM GERMAN PERIODICALS. 
toms has been attributed to the “ occult ” spavin, which induces 
no visible defect except atrophy of the muscles in the gluteal re¬ 
gion. Such cases may spontaneously recover; that is, the atro¬ 
phied muscles attain their proper size, and every trace of a 
prolonged lameness vanishes. 
We saw a horse that had suffered nearly a year from this 
hidden ailment, finally recover. We advised at the start that 
the animal be only moderately worked, and that he be turned 
loose in a box-stall with abundance of straw. This case led us 
to seek the seat of the irritation—not in the tibio-tarsal articula¬ 
tion, but in the stifle-joint proper. During the time the patient 
was lame, there developed, in the region of the infero-internal 
condyle of the femur, a hard growth, in the nature of an exosto¬ 
sis, the size of a hen’s egg. 
As a consequence of this discovery, we ever afterward, in all 
cases of hock lameness attributed to a spavin, examined the artic¬ 
ulation at the stifle; in most of these we recorded the presence 
of an enlargement at the inner side of the femur, and reached the 
conclusion that in the plurality of cases where the hock suffers 
from occult or apparent exostosis, the stifle is also involved. 
As a rule, the internal condyle of the thigh bone is involved, 
the process later embracing the articulating surfaces. The detec¬ 
tion of the alteration presupposes a vast deal of practice and ana¬ 
tomical knowledge. To aid in this, the animal is loaded by hi< 
rider or otherwise, and the two posterior limbs brought evenly 
together. 
Manual examination determines the afflicted side to be rounder 
and to possess fewer angles than its fellow of the opposite side 
while fever and pain are also found. It is good practice to be¬ 
come accustomed to the hypertrophied condyle in chronic spavir 
cases. Throughout the several years that we have recorded thi: 
peculiarity, we have observed but one exception to the rule, anc 
that was in a horse exhibiting a large spavin, but no lameness . 
Up to the present time we have been unable to explain th< 
process of this metastasis, and we are likewise not in a positioi 
to say that the exostoses occur in the vicinity of other joints that 
these enumerated. 
