OBSERVATIONS ON SOUNDNESS. 
691 
are consequent upon laryngeal action; but all of them are 
distinguished by certain general characters, or produced 
under such conditions that they are not likely, excepting from 
a very superficial examination, to be confounded with ab¬ 
normal noises. 
In obscure cases the patience of the examiner will often be 
severely taxed, the more so as the animals in question seem 
to possess the inconvenient faculty of knowing when they 
are particularly required to make the sounds, and steadily 
refusing to utter them according^. Several examinations 
may be necessary before the noise complained of can be 
elicited at all. The matter is meanwhile often rendered more 
unpleasant by the fact of the owner not comprehending that 
his horse may behave differently under different circumstances, 
and being, therefore, dreafully disgusted that the professional 
examiner fails to detect what he had previously discovered 
without difficulty. All these disagreeables, and many more, 
are incidental to that most unthankful and unsatisfactory 
business of the veterinary surgeon, the examination of horses 
as to soundness; but as “ Argus ” very justly says, i( if 
people will submit their horses to our examination, and pur¬ 
chasers will not buy without it, what can we do?” 
(To be continued .) 
OBSERVATIONS ON “ SOUNDNESS.” 
By R. H. Dyer, M.R.C.V.S., Waterford. 
(Continued from p. 455.) 
Most of the horses brought to us for inspection are the 
property of the breeder, who is, in nine cases out of ten, a 
farmer. When we bear this fact in mind, we can readily 
understand how it is so few feet are in a healthy state, so far 
as regards the outer or horny parts. 
The wall is found in one instance perfectly smooth ; in 
another, roughened and full of ridges; in which latter case 
some agency has been in operation to produce them. Counter 
irritation, wet, soft, and boggy places, will assist in promoting 
the growth of horn, and we are all aware how common it is 
to turn out a horse into some soft land when there is want of 
development in the horny structures of the feet. This, then, 
as well as some other things, will produce the kind of hoof 
