54 TREATMENT OF DISEASES 



convalescing, but the ownei* grew impatient, and put him on board 

 the boat, when in the course of twenty- four hours he died. 



The other two animals did not survive their arrival in this city- 

 over twenty-four hours ; notwithstanding the most rational treatment 

 they died of a complication of thoracic and abdominal disease. 

 During the progress of the malady, they had a discharge of viscous 

 matter, which adhered in thick incrustations around the margins of 

 the nostrils, and they suffered excruciating torment from sharp ab- 

 dominal pains, and their dung was liquid and bloody ; shortly before 

 death, their tongues acquired a brown color, and their gums and 

 teeth were covered with a dirty slime ; parts of the body were be- 

 dewed with cold, clammy sweats ; the evacuations became very fetid, 

 and all the other symptoms greatly aggravated ; soon they staggered 

 and fell, never to rise again. 



It is probable that this disease assumed the enzootic type ; it was 

 for a short time very fatal, especially when treated on the anti-phlo- 

 gistic plan ; in fact, so far as my knowledge goes, every horse so 

 treated, died. 



The only chance of bringing this malady to a favorable termina- 

 tion was to commence the treatment early, and then by the use of 

 sanitive stimulants and tonics sustain the vital powers, and thus 

 keep the patient alive while the disease ran its course. 



The agents used in the above case were, ginger, poplar bark, 

 chlorate of potass, and iodide of potass. 



DROPSY OF THE BRAIN. 



Operation on a Horse for Dropsy op the Brain. — The sub- 

 ject of the above named disease was a bay gelding, aged seven years. 

 The animal had been out of health for a few days. When my atten- 

 tion was called to him, I found him down on the right side ; from 

 appearances I should judge that he had struggled considerably, but 

 his struggles must have been of an unconscious and involuntary 

 character, as the pupil of the eye was amaurotic, and he was com- 

 pletely insensible to the prick of a pin. Occasionally the patient 

 would go into convulsions, kick with his limbs, and dash his head 

 about, not knowing what he did. It was noticed that he often jerked 

 his head backwards, as horses will do when the subjects of dropsy 

 of the brain. 



Having satisfied myself that this was a case of dropsy of the 

 brain — hydrocephalus — and there being but very little if any chance 

 of ever saving the subject, I obtained the owner's consent to trepan 

 or trephine my patient, and then draw off the fluid. 



The operation was performed as follows : having selected a point 

 at about the centre of the parietal bones, I made a crucial — cross- 

 shaped — incision, through the integuments, and dissected them for 

 a small circumference from the bone ; I than introduced the trephine 

 a little on one side of the suture, or ridge, and after sawing com- 

 pletely through the bono, removed a piece of the circumference of 

 half a dime. I now sent a curved trocar and canula, between the 

 lobes of the brain, down into the lateral ventricles, and after with- 



