412 
A. LlAtJTAKD. 
tion of the pressure of rest, whose quantity increases or diminishes 
according to the degree of inclination of the phalangial axis. 
On the other side, in a foot well made, which has not been 
distorted by the slioer, in a virgin foot, the frog and bars come in 
contact with the ground at each step of rest (this fact is acknow¬ 
ledged by all who have seen feet which have never been shod), and 
then with the wall assist in the support of the body and like it 
also, if not more, in the amortizement and diminution of the 
reactions. 
In the physiological condition, the plantar cushion is therefore 
submitted to opposite pressures, which are necessary to its vitality 
as every organ must perform its function to preserve its integrity 
of size and form. 
It is consequently logical to admit that each time this 
pressure is diminished, attenuated or destroyed, the vitality of 
the plantar cushion will be diminished in proportion. It is 
indeed what happens; first—when there is insufficient exercise 
and specially complete inaction ; second—when the frog is pared 
too much and ceases to rest on the ground; third—when as con¬ 
sequences of pain, an extremity is more or less relieved from 
resting on the ground. 
Now, every diminution in functional activity, carrying with 
itself an organic atrophy so much more rapid and marked that it 
is greater and more prolonged, it is also logical to admit that the 
plantar cushion—which is truly no exception to the common rule 
of all organs—must fatally undergo a change of atrophy every 
time that it is exposed to any of the causes above referred to ; when 
for instance the frog is relieved from pressure by excessive paring; 
again when the animal remains inactive in the stable, because, as 
M. Bouley says, though he attributes this fact to a different 
reason, “if the feet support in this case,the pressures which directly 
correspond to the weight of the body, they are never like those 
which act during locomotion, which increase with the rapidity of 
the motion of the body.” The plantar cushion mufft undergo a 
motion of atrophy more marked yet, where these two causes act 
simultaneously and when also a leg is totally relieved from pres 
sure at rest during intense lameness. 
