HORSE-BACK RIDING. 99 



regarded as having its origin in the stomach may de- 

 pend upon functional lesions of the intestines, or of 

 the spleno-hepatic apparatus. CHnical observation 

 leads us to regard dyspepsia as essential, sympto- 

 matic, or sympathetic — the latter being the result of 

 pathological reflex actions. 



According to Durand-Fardel, the symptoms of dys- 

 pepsia are : a digestion always slow, painful, or diffi- 

 cult, cardialgia, with increased sensibility to press- 

 ure, a development of gas in the stomach or intes- 

 tines, constipation and anorexia. These are the 

 principal symptoms of dyspepsia, and their presence 

 constitutes its chief characteristic. Though they 

 may not present themselves as we have given them, 

 yet they none the less constitute the most marked 

 features of dyspepsia, and, predominating in most of 

 the sufferers, they give place to other symptoms, 

 which in their turn are masked or replaced by a 

 third series. 



Dyspepsia, we must remember, is not alone a 

 symptom of gastric disorder ; for on the one hand we 

 have true neurosis, and on the other alterations in 

 the blood, mingling their symptoms with the more 

 local ones characteristic of the digestive disorder. 

 To acknowledge that digestive disorders, be their 

 cause what it may, produce perversion of the nutri- 

 tive function, is to admit as a consequence defi- 

 cient hematose, due to impoverished blood, loss of 

 strength and of flesh, and the development of a 



