Disorders of the foot of the horse / [Bracy Clark].

  • Clark, Bracy, 1771-1860
Date:
[1839]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Disorders of the foot of the horse / [Bracy Clark]. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    It will not be necessary here to enter more fully into this reasoning, as we have formerly devoted an entire volume to this all important service, and in the Podop- thora will be found the exact quantum of annual diminution that a foot actually sus- tains when so treated, and that in a good, first-rate, blood horse’s foot. By consulting the plates 9, 10, 11, of the last mentioned work, excellent examples may be seen of this disorder, and by comparing these feet with Plate I, or the frontispiece, being a view of that same foot as it first appeared at five years old, fresh from its Almighty Creator’s hand, before it had been touched by the workers in iron, we shall discover the astounding difference. Also the very term contraction does not appear fully to meet the case, since it is not merely a simple diminishing of the foot, as any body may be seen to diminish by waste, or by drying up, but is a real, as the Latin term expresses it, coarctation of the foot,* or forcing together of all its parts; and not only so, but there is also an upward pressure of the shoe from the violent ramming on and clenching the nails, which, in some feet, produces an erosion and ulceration of the nut-bone, a little moveable bone, placed above the sole, and immediately over the furch; and this erosion takes place apparently, from the natural movements of this bone being prevented by the general condensation of all the matters of the foot, im- peding the performing of its functions; see Erosion of the nut-bone, with examples, at the conclusion of the present series of disorders. Also, the arch of the sole, con- tracted in its dimensions by the exterior resistance of the nails, is driven up at its centre ; the furcal margins, or ridges of the sole are thus made to approach each other, and to ascend nearer to the nut-bone, and hence is discovered the true cause of nut- bone disease, or of the above erosion, not before properly understood, but which cause appears to have escaped the notice of those who have written upon it. Now, as to the remedy for the contracted foot, where this has gone on to the ab- sorption of the coffin-bone, there never can be an entire restoration; however, such feet can be greatly relieved by a shoe that does not compress the foot, but leaves it with a good degree of liberty ; and many examples of which relief, even with old feet, may be seen testified of by able and honest witnesses, in the book of testimonies appended to the work on The Expansion Shoe. And, in regard to prevention altogether, the Stereoplea may be consulted with advantage, which takes into consi- deration that part of the subject. And if this art, as it is, must be ever continued, it ought to be practiced.pnly by men well instructed in the economy of the foot, and by a proper attention flb science and rule, and not at random, as at present, by every blockhead, according to his simple notions, vastly to the detriment of the animal, and of the public security. * From con and arceo, to force together.