INTKODUCTION xvii 



much practical value. Starting with a healthy animal, free from hereditary 

 taint, sanitary science claims to know how to keep it healthy, and the claini 

 may lie admitted to be reasonable. At any rate failure can be shown to be 

 due not to want of knowledge on the part of the sanitarian, but to the 

 existence of obstacles which render that knowledge inapplicable ; and there 

 does occur not unfrequently an unsatisfactory combination of surroundings 

 in which, although it is cpiite easy to see what to do, the fact has to be 

 recognized that it is impossible to do it. 



Hygiene, dealing with the laws of health, forms a natural introduction 

 to its antithesis — pathology, — which relates to the laws of disease. An 

 elaborate treatise on the diseases of the horse has not been aimed at; 

 without, however, attempting an exhaustive description of the many 

 maladies which horse-flesh is heir to, it will be absolutely essential to enter 

 so far into the subject that the enquirer may not have to complain of 

 meagre information on matters which he rightly looks upon as most 

 important. An intelligent acquaintance with the principles of pathology is 

 rather calculated to check than to encourage rashness on the part of the 

 amateur doctor, and such knowledge is certainly not likely to incline its 

 possessor to undervalue the services of the experienced professional man. 



Horses are particularly liable to certain acute aftections of the digestive 

 and respiratory organs, and in many cases the success of remedial measures 

 will depend on the promptitude with which they are applied. Something- 

 must be done in sudden illness of man or beast, and no doubt can exist 

 of the desirability of using remedies which wdll be beneficial instead of 

 harmful. It would conduce to the interest of the veterinaiy surgeon, and 

 also to the well-being of domestic animals, if stock-owners were encouraged 

 to keep a supply of suitable remedies at hand for use in an emergency, 

 instead of being forced to take refuge in the employment of the numerous 

 nostrums which are ofl'ered, and of the composition of which no one but the 

 proprietor knows anything. 



Among the diseases of the horse, those which are traceable to the 

 invasion of parasites have received a considerable share of attention. Their 

 importance cannot well be overrated, whether these creatures occur in the 

 form of microbes of the disease - producing order, originating specific 

 actions which result in the development of infective material, or in the 

 more tangible shape of so-called worms occupying the cavities of the body 

 and causing irritation by their mere presence. The whole subject of 

 parasitism is profoundly interesting, and although it has for many years 

 been an absorbing study with many advanced scientists, some of whom 

 haA'e devoted their lives to the solution of the problems which it presents, 

 there are numerous mysteries yet to be elucidated in reference to the 



