102 THE HORSE AND THE WAR 



viction that the imported draught horses and mules from America are more 

 subject to it than others. What happens in the Ophthalmia Veterinary 

 Hospitals in France now is that the symptoms are found to be much alleviated, 

 even if they do not actually subside, by a hypodermic injection just above 

 the eye. There is no guarantee that the trouble will not recur, but it is certain 

 that the Service is making headway in the matter and that the trouble should 

 be got more and more in hand as time goes on. 



I come now to forms of sickness which are considered to be due almost 

 solely to animals having to work and stand about in mud. " Grease," cracked 

 heels, sloughing of the skin round the coronet and the pastern have been, 

 and are, a curse, especially where the heavy Shire horses from England are 

 concerned. Has the reader, who is not a veterinary scientist, ever heard 

 before of ulcerative cellulitis ? I have an idea it is only recently that it has 

 come into prominence. It is an ugly trouble which is helping to destroy 

 the usefulness of our war animals, and when on a horse's legs — generally his 

 hind ones — some running ulcers break out, they are diagnosed as ulcerative 

 cellulitis. The miscreant is a microbe which in time creeps higher until it 

 effects an entry into the body and attacks the kidneys. The sick horse is 

 doomed then and fit only for destruction. 



The excellent laboratories for bacteriological research — there is usually 

 one attached to every hospital — must have the credit for giving the Veterinary 

 Service the practical mastery of this disease ; that is, if the case is not too 

 far advanced when it comes up for treatment. I happen to know that one 

 hospital I visited dealt with 1,867 cases from January to October, 1917, and 

 595 cures were effected. Since then the percentage of cures has steadily 

 risen, there and everywhere. 



At another hospital, probably one of the best in France, the Commanding 

 Officer related a rather unusual incident to show that cellulitis does not neces- 

 sarily reveal its existence by ulcers in the leg. Among a new batch of sick 

 horses from the front there was one suffering from what seemed to be a simple 

 bullet wound in the loin. From the fact that there was a suppurating discharge 

 he concluded that the bullet was still lodged inside. He probed, and as the 

 instrument went in about ten inches, he decided to operate and search for the 

 bullet. At the second whiff of chloroform in the operating theatre the horse 

 fell dead^ — only the second horse lost under chloroform at this particular 

 hospital since the beginning of the war, the other being a horse with a very 

 diseased heart. Naturally a post-mortem examination was made, and a huge 

 abscess was found in one of the kidneys. On examining the pus it was found 

 to be precisely the same as that from the cellulitis ulcer. The incident, 

 therefore, taught the officer two things : (i) That the trouble does not always 

 show in the legs ; and (2) that should he again see a punctured wound in the 

 loin with suppuration, apparently a bullet wound, he would just test the 

 discharge, and if he found it to correspond with cellulitis he would know 

 that an operation would be unavailing. The only course would be destruction 

 of the animal. 



I think it will interest the reader if I say here what the proportion of 

 disease is as between horses and mules. For instance, I have already men- 



