290 THE HORSE. 



mation of the over-worked parts should ensue, and the occurrence of it may 

 probably be produced and the disease aggravated by the too prevalent absurd 

 mode of treating the animal. If a horse that has been ridden or driven 

 hard be suffered to stand in the cold, or if his feet be washed and not 

 speedily dried, he is very likely to have "fever in the feet." There is no 

 more fruitful source of inflammation in the human being, or the brute, than 

 these sudden changes of temperature. This has been explained as it 

 regards grease, but it bears more immediately on the point now under con- 

 sideration. The danger is not confined to the change from heat to cold ; a 

 sudden transition from cold to heat is as injurious, and therefore it is that so 

 many horses, after having been ridden far in the frost and snow, and placed 

 immediately in a hot stable, and littered up to the knees, are attacked by 

 this complaint. The feet and the lungs are the organs oftenest attacked, 

 because they have previously suffered most by our mismanagement, and 

 are most disposed to take on disease. Whatever would cause slight inflam- 

 mation of other parts, or trifling general derangement, will produce all its 

 mischief on these organs. 



Sometimes there is a sudden change of inflammation from one organ to 

 another. A horse shall have laboured for several days under evident inflam- 

 mation of the lungs; all at once that will subside, and the inflammation will 

 appear in the feet, or inflammation of the feet may follow similar affections 

 in the bowels or the eyes. 



To the attentive observer the symptoms are clearly marked, and yet there 

 is no disease so often overlooked by the groom and carter, and even by the 

 veterinary surgeon. The earliest symptoms of fever in the feet are fidgeti- 

 ness, frequent shifting of the fore-legs, but no pawing, much less any 

 attempts to reach the belly with the hind-feet. The pulse will soon be 

 quickened, the flanks heaving, the nostrils red, and the horse, by his anx- 

 ious countenance, and perhaps by moaning, indicating great pain. Pres- 

 ently, he will look about his litter, as if preparing to lie down, but he does 

 not do it immediately; he continues to shift from foot to foot; he is afraid 

 to draw his feet sufficiently under him for the purpose of lying down : but 

 at length he drops. The circumstance of his lying down at an early period 

 of the disease will sufficiently distinguish inflammation of the feet from 

 that of the lungs, in which the horse obstinately persists in standing until 

 he drops from mere exhaustion; and his quietness when down will distin- 

 guish it from colic or inflammation of the bowels, in both of which the 

 horse is frequently up and down, and rolling and kicking when down. 

 When the grievance is in the feet, the horse experiences so much relief, 

 from getting rid of the weight painfully distending the inflamed and highly 

 sensible little plates, that he is glad to lie as long as he can. He will like- 

 wise, as clearly as in inflammation of the lungs or bowels, point out the seat 

 of disease by looking at the part : his muzzle will sometimes rest on the feet 

 or the affected foot It is easy to conclude what all this indicates. 



If the feet be now examined, they will be evidently hot; the horse will 

 express pain if they are slightly rapped with a hammer, and the artery at 

 the pastern will throb violently. No great time will now pass, if the disease 

 be suffered to pursue its course, before he will be perfectly unable to rise ; 

 or, if lie is forced to get up, and one foot be lifted, he will stand with diflR- 

 culty on the other, or perhaps drop at once from intensity of pain. 



The treatment will resemble that of other inflammations, with such 

 differences as the situation of the disease may suggest. Bleeding is indis- 

 pensable; and that to its fullest extent. If the disease be confined to the 

 fore-feet, four quarts of blood should be taken as soon as possible from the 

 toe of each, at the situation pointed out, fig. 2, p. 249, and in the manner 



