112 THE ORANGE COUNTY 



CHAPTER VIII 



DISEASES OF HORSES. 



IT may be readily supposed that the animal doomed to 

 the manner of living which every variety of the horse experi- 

 ences, will be peculiarly exposed to numerous forms of suf- 

 fering; every natural evil will be aggravated, and many new 

 and formidable sources of pain and death will be super- 

 added. 



Interest and humanity require that we should become ac- 

 quainted with the nature, and causes, and remedy of the dis- 

 eases of the horse. 



The principal diseases of the horse are connected with the 

 circulatory system. From the state of habitual excitement 

 in which the animal is kept, in order to enable him to execute 

 his task, the heart and the blood-vessels will often act too 

 impetuously; the vital fluid will be hurried along too rap- 

 idly, either through the frame generally or some particular 

 part of it, and there will be congestion, accumulation of blood 

 in that part, or inflammation, either local or general, disturb- 

 ing the functions of some organ or of the whole frame. 



Congestion. 



Take a young horse on his first entrance into the stables ; 

 feed him somewhat highly, and what is the consequence? 

 He has swellings of the legs, or inflammation of the joints, 

 or perhaps of the lungs. Take a horse that has lived some- 

 what above his work, and gallop him to the top of his speed: 

 his nervous system becomes highly excited the heart beats 

 with fearful rapidity the blood is pumped into the lungs 

 faster than they can discharge it the pulmonary vessels 

 become gorged, fatigued, and utterly powerless the blood, 

 arrested in its course, becomes viscid, and death speedily 

 ensues. We have but one chance of saving our patient the 

 instantaneous and copious abstraction of blood; and only one 

 means of preventing the recurrence of this dangerous state ; 

 namely, not suffering too great an accumulation of the san- 

 guineous fluid by over-feeding, and by regular and system- 



