CORROSIVE OR IRRITANT POISONS 51 



or "butter" of antimony, as it is called. The effects then are of a cor- 

 rosive character, hydrochloric acid being the active ingredient. 



Symptoms. — Those of corrosive poisoning, sweating, purging, and 

 prostration being the most marked. 



Treatment. — Should be the same as for corrosive or irritant poisons. 



If a sufficient dose of antimony were taken to prove poisonous to a 

 horse, the treatment would consist in giving tannin and gallic acid, which 

 would form with it insoluble and harmless compounds. Decoctions of oak 

 or elm bark, which contain tannin, may be used in the absence of the active 

 principles themselves. 



LEAD 



Lead poisoning in animals is usually the result of feeding on tainted 

 pastures, or inhaling the fumes of chemical works, and manifests itself in 

 impaired digestion, capricious appetite, colicky pains in the bowels, followed 

 by constipation. After a variable lapse of time, the diagnostic symptom 

 appears, a greyish or blue discoloration along the margin of the gums. 

 It is deposited lead, which becomes more or less blackened by hydrogen 

 sulphide in the mouth, or by the administration of sulphur in the food. 

 Cramp and paralysis of the muscles, followed by wasting, choreic move- 

 ments, and convulsions, ending in blindness (amaurosis), commonly precede 

 death. 



Treatment. — If lead poisoning or plumbism is diagnosed before any 

 very serious wasting has occurred, an effectual antidote will be found in 

 dilute sulphuric acid, and sulphate of magnesia, given in repeated small 

 doses, as these have the effect of converting the lead into harmless insoluble 

 sulphate. The sulphate of magnesia assists also in regulating the bowels, 

 which, as we have seen, are disposed to constipation and to cramps; sulphur 

 and potassium iodide ai'e also employed as eliminants, given separately and 

 at short intervals. An occasional laxative dose of oil is advised when the 

 sulphate of magnesia is not being administered, as this hastens the removal 

 of lead salts excreted into the bowels. 



OXALIC ACID 



Death has been caused by the wilful administration of this acid, and by 

 horses eating the leaves of mangel-wurzel, in which it is generated by 

 fermentation while lying in heaps. The symptoms are similar to those 

 produced by corrosive mineral acids (p. 46), and it is besides a powerful 

 cardiac depressant. 



Treatment. — Frequent doses of saccharated carbonate of lime, lime- 

 water, or whitewash. These are chosen because they form insoluble salts 



