26o Veterhiary Medicine. 



may remain fluid so long as it is retained in the chest, it coagu- 

 lates rapidly when withdrawn. The dropsical effusion rarely 

 contains fibrine, and then only in very small amount, and it does 

 not coagulate when drawn off from the chest. The inflammatory 

 effusion usually contains a greater proportion of common salt, 

 phosphates or albumen than exist in the blood, and floating 

 granules, particles and cell forms, none of which conditions charac- 

 terize the dropsical effusions. The most prominent feature of 

 the inflammatory effusions is thus seen to be their power of co- 

 agulation, by virtue of the contained fibrine, when exposed to 

 the air. 



Symptoms. When a sequel of pleurisy it is manifested b}^ the 

 symptoms already mentioned under that head as indicating the oc- 

 currence of effusion. 



The dropsical cases may come on rapidly and present all the 

 signs of troubled respiration together with the results of ausculta- 

 tion and percussion that characterize rapid inflammatory effusion 

 but without the fever and acute symptoms of pleurisy. More 

 usually it comes on insidiously, the lung accommodates itself to 

 the gradual increase of the fluid and it is only when the accumu- 

 lation has become excessive that the symptoms become promi- 

 inent. In heart or kidney disease the filling of the legs and infil- 

 trations of the eyelids and of the skin beneath the chest and ab- 

 domen are precursors or early concomitants of the disease, but in 

 all cases the accumulation in the chest is to be measured by the 

 height of the line of dulness on percussion and the extent of chest 

 surface giving forth no respiratory murmur on auscultation. As 

 the liquid rises on both sides of the chest, as it always does in such 

 cases in the horse, the breathing becomes short and labored, being 

 chiefly effected by the action of the diaphram and the flanks — the 

 ribs moving only slightly. The nostrils are widely dilated with 

 each breath. The previously existing want of vigor and energy, 

 the weak pulse, the poor appetite and the pallor of the mucous 

 membranes become aggravated ; the animal becomes very weak 

 and prostrate, the loins insensible, the permanently tucked up 

 flanks labor tumultuously, the loins rise in inspiration, the face 

 is pinched and haggard, the eyeballs glazed and protruding, and 

 death is preceded by the same general symptoms as in rapid effu- 

 sion after pleurisy. A prominent feature of this, as of all dropsi- 



