180 THE ANATOMY AND DISEASES OF THE NOSE AND MOUTH. 



veterinary surgeon is indispensable ; and he will sometimes experience consider- 

 able difficulty in deciding the case. One circumstance "will principally guide 

 him. No disease will run on to glanders which has not, to a considerable and 

 palpable degree, impaired and broken down tbe constitution ; and every disease 

 that does this will run on to glanders. He will look then to the general state and 

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

 discharge, and the character of the ulceratiorc, 



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

 indeed the appearance of cruelty, and which only the safet}' of a valuable 

 animal, or of a whole team, can justify. He will inoculate an ass, or a horse 

 already condemned to the hounds, with the matter discharged from the nose. If 

 the horse is glandcred, the symptoms of glanders or farcy will appear in the 

 inoculated animal in the course of a few days. 



The post mortem examination of the horse will remove every doubt as to the 

 character of the disease. The nostril is generally more or less blanched, with 

 spots or lines of inflammation of considerable intensity. Ulceration is almost 

 invariably found, and of a chancrous character, on the septum, and also on the 

 sethmoid and turbinated bones. The ulcers evidently follow the course of the 

 absorbents, sometimes almost confined to the track of the main vessel, or, if 

 scattered over the membrane generally, thickest over the path of the lymphatic. 

 The sethmoid and turbinated bones are often filled with pus, and sometimes eaten 

 through and carious ; but, in the majority of cases, the ulceration is confined to 

 the external membrane, although there may be pus within. In aggravated cases 

 the disease extends through all the cells of the face and head. 



The path of the disease down the larynx and windpipe is easily traced, 

 and the ulcers follow one line that of the absorbents. In aggravated cases, 

 this can generally be traced on to the lungs. It produces inflammation in these 

 organs, characterised in some cases by congestion ; but in other cases, the con- 

 gestion having gone on to hepatisation, in which the cellular texture of the lungs 

 is obliterated. Most frequently, when the lungs are affected at all, tubercles are 

 found miliary tubercles minute granulated spots on the surface, or in the 

 substance of the lungs, and not accompanied by much inflammation. In a few 

 cases there are larger tubercles, which soften and burst, and terminate in 

 cavities of varying size. 



In some cases, and showing that glanders is not essentially or necessarily a 

 disease of the lungs, there is no morbid affection whatever in those organs. 



The history thus given of the symptoms of glanders will clearly point out its 

 nature. It is an affection of the membrane of the nose. Some say, and at their 

 head is Professor Dupuy, that it is the production of tubercles, or minute 

 tumours in the upper cells of the nose, which may long exist undetected, except 

 by a scarcely perceptible running from the nostril, caused by the irritation which 

 they occasion. These tubercles gradually 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 neighbour- 

 ing glands, and this, with greater or less rapidity, vitiates the constitution of the 

 animal, and is capable of communicating the disease to others. Some content 

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

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

 exceedingly slowly, run on to ulceration. 



It is inflammation, whether specific or common, of the lining membrane of 

 the nose possibly for months, and even for years, confined to that membrane, 

 and even to a portion of it the health and the usefulness of the animal not 

 being in the slightest degree impaired. Then, from some unknown cause, not 

 a new but an intenser action is set up, the inflammation more speedily runs its 



