or
whether accompanied with the complication of arthritis, there must be a
total suspension of effort until the danger is over. Less than a month's
quiet ought not to be thought of--the longer the better.

Good results may also be expected from local applications. The various
lotions which cool the parts, the astringents which lower the tension of
the blood vessels, the tepid fomentations which accelerate the
circulation in the engorged capillaries, the liniments of various
composition, the stimulants, the opiate anodynes, the sedative
preparations of aconite, the alterative frictions of iodin--all these
are recommended and prescribed by one or another. We prefer
counterirritants, for the reason, among many others, that by the
promptness of their action they tend to prevent the formation of the
bony deposits. The lameness will often yield to the blistering action of
cantharides, in the form of ointment or liniment, and to the alterative
preparations of iodin or mercury. If the owner of a "spavined" horse
really succeeds in removing the lameness, he has accomplished all that
he is justified in hoping for; beyond this let him be well persuaded
that a "cure" is impossible.

For this reason, moreover, he will do well to be on his guard against
the patented "cures" which the traveling horse doctor may urge upon him,
and withhold his faith from the circular of the agent who will deluge
him with references and certificates. It is possible that nostrums may
in some exceptional instances prove serviceable, but the greater number
of them are capable of producing only injurious effects. The removal of
the bony tumor can not be accomplished by any such means, and if a trial
of these unknown compounds should be followed by complications no worse
than the establishment of one or more ugly, hairless cicatrices, it will
be well for both the horse and his owner.

Rest and counterirritation, with the proper medicaments, constitute,
then, the prominent points in the treatment designed for the relief of
bone spavin. Yet there are cases in which all the agencies and methods
referred to seem to lack effectiveness and fail to produce satisfactory
results. Either the rest has been prematurely interrupted or the
blisters have failed to modify the serous infiltration, or the case in
hand has some undiscernible characteristics which seem to have rendered
the disease neutral to the agencies used against it. An indication of
more energetic means