124 



THE HORSE. 



horse, as well as to the situation of the glands, the nature of the discharge 

 and character of the ulceration. 



If, after all, he is in doubt, an experiment may be resorted to, which 

 wears indeed the appearance of cruelty, and which only the safety of a 

 valuable animal, or of a whole team, can justify : he will inoculate an as^ 

 or a horse already condemned to the hounds with the matter dischargea 

 from the nose. If tlie horse be glandcred, the symptoms of glanders or 

 farcy will appear in the inoculated animal in the course of a few days. 



The history we have given of the symptoms of glanders will pretty 

 clearly point out its nature. It is an atfection of the membrane of the 

 nose. Some say that is the production of tubercles, or minute tumours 

 in the upper cells of the nose, which may long exist undetected, and hard 

 to be detected except by a scarcely perceptible running from the nostril, 

 caused by the slight irritation which they occasion. These tubercles grad- 

 ually become more numerous ; they cluster together, suppurate, and break ; 

 and small ulcerations are formed. The ulcers discharge a poisonous matter, 

 which is absorbed and taken up by the neighbouring glands, and which, 

 with greater or less rapidity, vitiates the constitution of the animal, and is 

 capable of communicating the disease to others. Other surgeons content 

 themselves with saying that it is an inflammation of the membrane of the 

 »ose, which may assume an acute or chronic form, or in a very short time, 

 or exceedingly slowly, run on to ulceration. 



The malady proceeds as we have already described it, but, before its 

 termination, becomes connected with farcy. Few horses die of glanders 

 without exhibiting some appearance of farcy ; and farcy, in its latter stages, 

 is almost invariably accompanied by glanders: ihey are different forms or 

 stages of the same disease. 



There can be no doubt that the membrane of the nose is the original seat 

 of glanders; that the disease is for a time purely local ; that the inflamma- 

 tion of the tubercles must proceed to suppuration before that matter is 

 formed on which the poisoning of the constitution depends; that the whole 

 circulation does at length become empoisoned ; and that the horse is 

 destroyed by the general irritation and disease produced. 



Glanders may be either bred in the horse, or communicated by conta- 

 gion. What we have further to remark on this malady will be arranged 

 under these two heads. 



Improper stable management we believe to be a far more frequent cause 

 of glanders than contagion. The air which is necessary to respiration is 

 changed and empoisoned in its passage through the lungs, and a fresh 

 suppfy is necessary for the support of life. That supply may be sufficient, 

 barely to support life, but not. to prevent the vitiated air from again and 

 again passing to the lungs, and producing irritation and disease. The 

 membrane of the nose, possessed of extreme sensibility for the purpose of 

 smell, is easily irritated by this poison, and close and ill-ventilated stables 

 oftenest witness the ravages of glanders. Professor Coleman relates a 

 case, which proves to demonstration the rapid and fatal agency of this 

 cause. " In the expedition to Quiberon, the horses had not been long 

 on board the transports, before it became necessary to shut down the 

 hatchways (we believe for a few hours only) ; the consequence of this was 

 that some of them were suffocated, and that all the rest were disembarked 

 either glandered or farcied."* 



In a close stable, the air is not only poisoned by being repeatedly 



Percivall's excellent Lectures on the Veterinary Art, vol. iii. p. 455. 



