SINEWS
—is the fashionable and common term for the tendinous coat of the muscles extending from the back of a horse's knee to the fetlock joint, when which is in any degree elongated by strain, twist, or any other accident, the horse is then said to be broken down in the BACK SINEWS. The sinews or tendons are liable at all times to violent spasmodic contractions (see Cramp) not only in any one of the extremities, but throughout the whole body; the immediate and remote causes of which are hitherto undiscovered, and will most probably remain so, in respect to certainty; although there are not wanting speculators of mental fertility, who attribute them to various causes, without having, perhaps, in the whole number, fixed upon the right. One class of these suppose, convulsive contractions of the tendons are occasioned by surfeits, or the want of proper evacuation; another, from too plentiful and repeated bleedings, too violent purgings, or too hard labour; assigning for a reason, "that these fill the hollowness of the SINEWS with cold windy vapours, which are the only great causes of convulsions." Where they occur from accidental causes, and casual injuries, as in wounds, perforations, or instrumental incisions, the origin is obvious, and in a certain degree points out the immediate road to local relief. When a tendon has been in part divided, or only punctured, a succession of painful and most alarming symptoms invariably ensue, and relief can only be obtained by early application to the best opinion, and most experienced judgment, that can be produced; with the very slender and mortifying consolation, that not one in twenty (if severely injured) ever after proves of any permanent utility.