358 CYCLOPEDIA OF LITE STOCK AND COMPLETE STOCK DOCTOR. 



fever which leads on to the conditions spoken of above, and sometimes 

 to furuncle and carbuncle. It is most common on limestone roads, the 

 soil being irritating. 



How to know it. — Swelling of the legs is seen. After being exposed 

 for a day or more to cold, wet mud, or ice-water, they will be found to 

 be very hot and sore next morning. After a few days the hair will be 

 filled with scabs that cling tightly to the skin, but after a few days more 

 tbey will loosen and come off, bringing the hair with them, leaving the 

 legs entirely bare sometimes. There is usually more or less systemic 

 fever with rheumatic tendencies. 



What to do. — If had, leave the horse in for a few days, wash the legs 

 with warm water and bathe them afterwards with lotion. No. 24. Repeat 

 this two or three times a day. When the swelling begins to go out of 

 them and the skin gets scaly, grease them with fresh lard once a day well 

 rubbed in. Give internally two tablespoonfulls of Glauber's salt three 

 times a day for a few days and follow that with No. 22. 



Mud fever often runs into f urunculus which will next be described. 



Vm. Furunculus or Carbuncle. 



Furunoulus is the name applied by Prof. McEachran to what is called 

 by many mud fever in an aggravated form, when it takes the form of 

 carbuncle. It attacks the legs, but usually is confined to the coronary 

 region and pastern. It acts a good deal like a bad boil, swells very large, 

 gets very hard and is awfully painful, so much so that when it comes 

 under the coronary band or on the front of the pastern it is often fatal, 

 especially on the hind foot. 



Causes. — All the causes that belong to mud fever are applicable to 

 furuncle, and, in addition, an unhealthy condition of the blood which 

 always has a tendency to aggravate any malady. 



How tc know it. — Extreme lameness is usually the first symptom 

 noticed ; a reluctance to put the weight on the foot ; a continual raising 

 of the foot, indicating great pain ; the horse does not lie down ; great 

 fever in the system ; mouth hot ; eyes red ; nostrils dilated and more or 

 less blowing ; swelling of the coronet in the region of the carbuncle, unless 

 it is situated an inch or more above the coronet. When this has run on 

 for twenty-four hours the skin breaks in rags and in the course of the 

 next ten hours it sloughs off and a core goes with it varying in size from 

 a cherry to that of a man's thumb. Sometimes the skin sloughs off from 

 a surface as large as the palm of a man's hand. When these cases are 

 fatal the horse dies from irritative fever and exhaustion from pain. The 

 appetite is not always affected, the pain being so great a drain on the 

 system that the horse will often eat more than usual ; but in all cases he 

 loses flesh fast and becomes thin and tucked up in a very few days. 



