Hush^ on studying' the diseases of Animals. Ivii 



subsistence, all of whom perhaps perished by diseases that 

 might have been cured. 



7th. By extending our knowledge of the causes and cure 

 of the diseases of domestic animals, we may add greatly to 

 the certainty and usefulness of the profession of medicine as 

 far as it relates to the human species. The organization ot 

 their bodies, the principle of animal life, and the manner in 

 which the remote and proximate causes of diseases produce 

 their morbid effects, are the same as in the human body, and 

 most of medicines produce in them, and us, nearly a similar 

 operation. Their acute diseases are the same as ours. They 

 are subject to epidemics from an impure atmosphere as well 

 as from contagions. Fevers, catarrhs — haemorrhages — dy- 

 sentery — dropsy — scrophula — vertigo — madness — worms, — ■ 

 stone, hydrophobia and apoplexy, affect horses, horned 

 cattle, sheep, hogs and dogs. The rheumatism, angina and 

 tetanus affect horses. Cows are subject to diabetes. Can- 

 cers have been observed in dogs. Cats suffer and die from a 

 disease which appears to be a form of bilious fever. Cutane- 

 ous eiuptions and sores are common to them all. In short, 

 when we except the diseases which are the effects of certain 

 trades and pi'ofessions, of intemperance, of the operations of 

 the mind, and of a peculiar function in the female body, there 

 is scarcely a form of disease mentioned in our systems of no- 

 sology, but what is to be met with in domestic animals. 



To encourage us to extend to them the benefits of medi- 

 cine, let us attend to the light and knowledge which several 

 branches of our science have already derived from them. Du- 

 ring those ages in which it was deemed criminal to dissect a 

 human body, the bodies of domestic animals afforded the only 

 sources of instruction in anatomy and physiology, and even 

 since those ages of ignorance and prejudice have passed awav, 

 many important discoveries have been derived from the same 

 sources by accident or design. 



The discovery of the salivary glands in an ox by Dr. Whar- 

 ton ; of the fallopian tubes in an ewe by Rufus ; of the thora- 



