78 THE IxMPROVED ART OF FARRIERY. 



1732. His account is very precise and excellent. He 

 says — 



" That the horses were seized suddenly with a dry- 

 sounding cough, which shook them so violently that 

 they appeared ready to drop with hard straining and 

 want of breath. Their throats were sore, and the 

 glands were much swelled and inflamed, and painful 

 to the touch. For the first two days most of them 

 refused all manner of food as well as water ; and had 

 so many other bad symptoms, that when this distemper 

 first broke out it seemed to threaten a mortality among 

 them. Indeed, the only good sign they had was a 

 running at the nose, which generally began on the 

 third day, and continued in a very profuse degree for 

 five or six days. While this secretion continued they 

 could not feed much, though their appetites were not 

 deficient. Hence they lost their flesh exceedingly, 

 whilst the violence of the complaint lasted; but as 

 soon as the distemper abated, they began to eat vo- 

 raciously, and soon recovered. This distemper, though 

 seldom fatal, yet was so very catching, that when any 

 horse was seized with it, those horses that stood on 

 each side of him were generally infected as soon as he 

 began to run at the nose. While this sickness lasted, 

 about one hundred troop-horses under my care were 

 seized with it. I always caused the sick horses to be 

 separated from those in health, and in one troop of 

 horse-grenadiers we filled a stable of thirty-six stalls 

 in three days, and another of eighteen in three or four 

 days more ; nevertheless, all of them recovered in a 

 short time. And many other horses belonging to pri- 

 vate gentlemen that were placed under my care did 

 well, without any remaining injury from the distemper ; 

 and it was remarkable that some which had been sub- 

 ject to a dry cough before this sickness contmued, were 



