582 
W. BRYDEN. 
blister of bin iodide of mercury ointment, applied above the 
coronet, which took three weeks to heal, during which time 
he was worse, if possible, than at the beginning. The blister 
was a mistake. 
I then had him stand in mud during the day, and at night 
ordered his feet to be wrapped in long bandages soaked in 
lime water, linseed oil and soft potash soap, to which was 
added a little carbolic acid. These were neatly put on the 
hoofs in figure eight fashion, and kept soaked with the prepar¬ 
ation. He tolerated this treatment and began to improve 
very rapidly, and on the day he was destroyed, July 27th, 
from two to three weeks after I had stopped treatment, he 
was able to trot off after two or three twitches, on starting a 
quite natural gait, both on a straight course and in turning, 
something he was unable to do before being treated. 
So far as I am aware, this discovery was made by my 
father over thirty years ago in Northern Vermont, where our 
family settled on arriving in this country from Scotland, and 
where we remained for six years before removing to Boston in 
1861. He was led to it by observing the large number of colts 
every spring with defective hoofs and legs, which he attributed 
mainly to the restraints and idleness incident to domestica¬ 
tion and the want of tear and wear to the hoofs during the 
long winter months, especially while the animals were grow¬ 
ing. Many have treated the hoofs for defects and diseases of 
the feet, but no one before had ever grasped the grand con¬ 
ception that they dominated and determined the character of 
the limbs, and influenced the conformation of the body, too. 
On my graduation from the Montreal Veterinary College in 
1871, I took up at his request the study of the subject and 
submitted to The Veterinarian at least two short articles 
on springhalt and other diseases peculiar to horses’ limbs, 
and which I maintained were caused by defective conditions 
of their hoofs; the first in 1873, I think, the second in July, 
1875. Since then I have contributed to about all of the vet¬ 
erinary journals published in Great Britain and America ar¬ 
ticles relating to animal locomotion and veterinary orthope¬ 
dics, among which springhalt was always included. 
