may be, either full of blood, serum, or pus, some blemish
usually remains after treatment.

_Prognosis._--Though simple bruises of the knee without extensive
lesions are usually of trifling account, a different prognosis must be
pronounced when the lesion assumes more important dimensions, and though
a capped knee may be comparatively of little importance we have seen
cases in which not only extensive blemishes were left to disfigure the
patient, but the animals had become worthless in consequence of the
extension of the diseased process to the various elements composing the
joint, and giving rise to the most complicated cases of carpitis.

_Treatment._--Usually the first symptom of trouble is the edematous
swelling on the front of the "knee." The prevention of the inflammation
and consequently of the abscess, is the prime object in view, and it may
be realized by the use of warm-water fomentations or compresses applied
over the swelling, which may be used either in a simple form or combined
with astringents, such as Goulard's extract, alum, or sulphate of zinc.
The application of warm poultices of oil meal or ground flaxseed,
enveloping the whole joint and kept in place by bandages, is often
followed by absorption of the swelling, or, if the abscess is in process
of formation, by the active excretion of pus. If an abscess forms in
spite of these precautions it may be treated surgically in several ways.

In one it should be done by a careful incision, which will allow the
escape of the blood or the serum, or of the pus which is inclosed in the
sac; in another it may be by means of a seton, in order that the
discharge may be maintained and allowed to escape; for another we may
adopt the more cautious manner of emptying the cavity by means of
punctures with small trocars or aspirators. The danger attending this
last method arises from the possible sloughing of large portions of the
skin, while that attending the first is the hazard of the possibility of
the extension of the inflammation to the capsular ligament of the knee,
with the possibility of an open joint in prospect.

As we have remarked, the cavity after being emptied may rapidly close
and leave in a short time but slight traces of its previous existence.
But in many, if not in most cases, there will remain, after the
cicatrization is complete, a thickening or organized exudation at one
time round and well defined, at another spreading by a diffused
infiltrati