process usually begins in front. It is this part of the coronary band
that is always most actively affected with inflammation, and
consequently it is here that impairments first occur.

Suppuration of the sensitive sole is more common than of the sensitive
laminae and coronary band. It is present in the majority of cases in
which there is a dropping of the coffin bone, and in other instances
when the effusion at this point is so great as to arrest the production
of horn and uncover the sensitive tissues. Except when the result of
injury it begins at the toe and spreads backward, and, if not relieved
by opening the sole, escapes at the heel. Suppuration of the sole is
much less serious than in other parts of the foot.

If the acute constitutional symptoms developed from sloughing of the
foot do not result in death, a new hoof of very imperfect horn may be
developed after a time; but unless the animal is to be kept for breeding
purposes alone the foot will ever be useless for work and death should
relieve the suffering. When only the sole sloughs, recovery takes place
with proper treatment.

_Peditis._--This is the term that Williams applies to that serious
complication of laminitis in which not only the laminae, but the
periosteum membrane covering the bone and coffin bone also are subjects
of the inflammatory process. Neither is this all; in some of these cases
of peditis acute inflammation of the coffin joint is present, and
occasionally suppuration of the joint. A mild form of periostitis, in
which the exudation is in the outer layer of the periosteum only, is a
more common condition than is recognized generally by practitioners.
Intimate contiguity of structures is the predisposing cause, for the
disease either spreads from the original seat or the complication occurs
as one of the primary results of the exciting cause. In the severer
cases in which the exudate separates the periosteum from the bone,
suppuration, gangrene, and superficial caries are common results. If
infiltration of the bone tissues is rapid the blood supply is cut off by
pressure upon the vessels and death of the coffin bone follows. Grave
constitutional symptoms mark these changes, which soon prove fatal.

In the mild cases of periostitis it is by no means easy positively to
determine its presence, for there are no special symptoms by which it
may be distinguished from pure laminitis. In a majority of acute cases,
though, which show no signs o