STOMACH-STAGGERS. J 03 



of these would be to quicken the circulation, and to send yet mo-e blood to 

 that organ which already had a great deal too much. 



STOMACH-STAGGERS. 



A disease not much unlike this is known under the name of Staggers. 

 There are two varieties of it — the sleepy or stomach-staggers, and the mad- 

 staggers ; frequently, iiowever, they are only dilFerent stages of the same 

 disease, or varying with the cause that produced them. In Stomach-Stag- 

 gers the horse stands dull, sleepy, staggering ; when roused, he looks 

 vacantly around him ; perhaps seizes a lock of hay, and dozes again with 

 It in his mouth ; at length he drops and dies : or the sleepiness passes olf, 

 and delirium comes on, when he falls, rises again, drops, beats himself 

 about, and dies in convulsions. The cause of tliis is sutiicienlly evident ; 

 and the disease never occurs, except by the fault of those who have the 

 management of the horse. It arises from over-feeding. The horse has 

 been permitted to get at a too great quantity of food, or food of an improper 

 nature. When he has been kept for some hours without eating, and has 

 been worked hard, and has become thoroughly hungry, he falls ravenously 

 upon every kind of food he can get at; swallowing it faster than his small 

 stomach can digest it ; and no water being given to soften it, and to hasten 

 its passage, the stomach becomes crammed, and having been previously 

 exhausted by long lasting, is unable to contract upon its contents. The food 

 soon begins to ferment and to swell, causing great distension ; the brain 

 sympathizes with tliis overloaded organ, and staggers are produced. We 

 can easily imagine this, when we remember the sad headaches occasionally 

 arising from an overfdled or disordered stomach. Sometimes the stomach 

 is ruptured. 



We have little to say of the treatment of the disease so far as medicine 

 iS concerned, except that as it is almost or quite impossible for the person 

 most accustomed to horses to distinguish between the early stage of sto- 

 mach and mad staggers (distension of the stomach, and inflammation of 

 the brain), we should be most diligent and minute in our inquiry into the 

 history of the horse for the preceding twenty-four hours — whether he could 

 have got at an undue quantity of food, or had been worked hard and kept 

 long fasting. Some say that there is a yellowness of the eye, and twitch- 

 ings about the breast in the early stage of sleepy or stomach-staggers. We 

 have seen a great many cases of stomach-staggers without this yellowish- 

 ness, or these catchings, and we believe that no one can certainly distin- 

 guish between the two, and that we must be guided entirely by the history 

 of the case. 



Bleed very largely ; — that cannot do harm, and in mad staggers is indis- 

 pensable. Give a good dose of physic — that also cannot do harm, although 

 in stomach-staggers it cannot do much good, for it can scarcely find its way 

 into the over-distended stomach, and it certainly cannot find its way through 

 it. Keeping the horse from ail food will be a very proper proceeding, 

 whichever be the disease. 



Some good judges have affirmed that a horse was never cured of stomach- 

 staggers. It was formerly a very difficult thing, but the stomach-pump has 

 done wonders in cases of poisoning in the human being, and, by means of a 

 larger and somewhat altered pump, (which every veterinary surgeon, and, 

 we think, every large proprietor of horses, should have on his premises,} 

 .his enormous mass of food n-ay, without difficulty, be washed out. 



If, however, we can say but lillle of the treatment of stomach-staggers, 

 we have much to say of its prevention. It attacks old horses oflener than 



