ETIOLOGY OF SPAVIN. 
107 
them to restraints incompatible with the robust development, es¬ 
pecially of their, locomotory organs. 
Still less remote causes are work for which the animal is not 
adapted, and improper shoeing and management. 
The causes of the new-born formation are repeated or continued 
irritation from strains, at the points of attachment of muscles, 
tendons, and ligaments to bone, and continued or repeated irri¬ 
tations or inflammations of the soft tissues of joints, connective 
tissue metamorphoses, injuries to cartilages, metamorphoses of 
cartilage, so-called physiological hypertrophy, interstitial new¬ 
born formation, wounds, direct injury to any joint from over¬ 
work , &c. 
In all weak and imperfectly developed limbs, we find hoofs 
equally imperfect and liable to disease. From its peculiarity of 
being a “ horny box,” the hoof may either confine and interfere 
with the circulation and nutrition not only of itself, but of the 
whole limb; or it may, when weak either from want of tear and 
wear by exercise, or other cause, imperfectly protect the extrem¬ 
ity, thereby exerting an influence on the limb quite as pernicious. 
Such peripheral disturbances intensify previous weaknesses 
of the limb. In the young it may only impair, or arrest growth 
for a while, but in those older it leads to new changes in its form 
and position, and in the length and quality of its parts, if not 
remedied by proper management. 
I have never yet examined a recently sprained hock, without 
finding changes in other part of the limb and in the form of the 
hoof which must have preceded the pathological changes in the 
bones; consequently, whatever changes take place in other parts 
of the limb, after such new-born formations are apparent, whether 
concurrent or as the result of the new-born formation, they must 
have been preceded by an imperfect condition of the limb of 
equal if not greater importance. There is such an uniformity in 
the shape of hoofs of recently strained limbs , that even when 
detected they tvill , when more closely studied , indicate the charac¬ 
ter of the hock with as much certainty as the horse’s teeth now 
indicates his age. 
When the foot of a limb obnoxious to spavin is placed on the 
