This articulation, so movable in every direction in the human species, is not so much so in quadrupeds; the arm in the latter, as also the shoulder, being kept in contact with the lateral region of the thorax by the numerous muscles which surround it.
Of the movements performed by the humerus, flexion and extension are the most extensive; those of abduction and adduction are much less so.
It is necessary, before proceeding further, to determine what the two principal movements which we have just mentioned really are, viz., flexion and extension.
We know that in man the displacements of the humerus which take place in the antero-posterior direction are known as movement or projection forwards, and movement or projection backwards, respectively. We do not say that the humerus is flexed or extended, because, in reality, on account of the position which the skeleton of the shoulder occupies, it is not able to flex or place itself on the line of prolongation of the scapula with which it articulates.
In quadrupeds it is not so. The humerus and the scapula are contained in almost the same vertical plane; and the bone of the arm can take, in relation to the latter, the positions characteristic of flexion and extension--that is, of approach to the scapula and removal from it.
What makes the meanings of these terms a little confusing is that, in human anatomy, some authors consider the backward movement of the humerus as extension, and the forward movement as flexion; in order to be able to compare these movements to those that the femur executes in relation to the pelvis.
Now, in our opinion, the indication of this correspondence is not absolutely necessary; since it ceases to be exact if we wished, from the point of view of the direction given to other segments of the skeleton, to establish the same relation between the elbow and the articulation of the knee.
It is therefore indispensable, when discussing quadrupeds, to discontinue these terms, in order the more readily to recognise that: in flexion the inferior extremity of the humerus is directed backwards; in extension, on the contrary, it is directed forwards. In the first case the humerus approaches the scapula; in the second, on the contrary, it moves away from it.