penetrate the frog and
remain for several days without causing lameness; in fact, in many cases
of punctured wound of the frog the first evidence of the injury is the
finding of the nail or the appearance of an opening where the skin and
frog unite, from which more or less pus escapes. Even when the sole is
perforated, if the injury is not too deep, no lameness develops until
suppuration is established. In all cases of foot lameness, especially if
the cause is obscure, the foot should be examined for evidence of
injury.

The lameness from punctured wounds, accompanied with suppuration, is
generally severe, the patient often refusing to use the affected member
at all. The pain being lancinating in character, he stands with the
injured foot at rest or constantly moves it back and forth. In other
cases the patient lies down most of the time with the feet outstretched;
the breathing is rapid, the pulse fast, the temperature elevated, and
the body covered with patches of sweat.

When the plantar aponeurosis is injured, the pus escapes with difficulty
and the wound shows no signs of healing; the whole foot is hot and very
painful. If the puncture involves the sesamoid sheath, the synovial
fluid escapes. At first this fluid is pure, like joint water, but later
becomes mixed with the products of suppuration and loses its clear,
amber color. Suppuration generally extends up the course of the flexor
tendon, an abscess forms in the hollow of the heel, and finally opens
somewhere below the fetlock joint. The whole coronet is more or less
swollen, the discharge is profuse and often mixed with blood, yet the
suffering is greatly relieved from the moment the abscess opens.

If the puncture reaches the navicular bone the lameness is intense from
the beginning; but the only certain way to determine the existence of
this complication is by the use of the probe; and unless there is a free
escape of synovia it must be used with the greatest of care, else the
coffin joint may be opened. If the coffin joint has been penetrated,
either by the offending instrument or by the process of suppuration,
acute inflammation of the joint follows, accompanied with high fever,
loss of appetite, etc. The ankle and coronet are now greatly swollen,
and dropsy of the leg to the knee or hock, or even to the body, often
follows. If the process of suppuration continues, small abscesses appear
at intervals on different parts of the coronet, the patient rapidly