GENERAL PATHOLOGY. 53 



pathologists, it is beyond reasonable conjecture, that those 

 who saw only epithelial denudation of the fauces, should 

 have described ulcerations and abscesses involving even the 

 glands of the throat, sometimes the cesopliagiiSy extending to 

 the lungs, and inducing in the liver a general rottenness ; and 

 all this while the same tendency to the development of 

 purulent abscesses being exhibited in all the external tissues. 



There seems, in the descriptions of Layard, of the dis- 

 temper of 1745,* hardly a symptom or post-mortem appear- 

 ance to be viewed as in common with those of the Pest, 

 except those which necessarily attend all inflammatory action. 

 Even the fat in all parts of the system remained of a IrigJit 

 yellow, and the flesh soon turned green. Should the plea be 

 interposed that, in the cases described by Dr. Mortimer, the 

 pneumonic symptoms overshadowed the current epizootic, 

 the reply is fairly to be made, that Mortimer, who was as 

 learned an expert as the medical profession of his day could 

 produce, does not, if his statements are fairly canvassed or 

 credited, admit or support the possibility of the existence of 

 any other primary affection than that embraced in and 

 bounded by the pneumonic congestion. And if this had a 

 marked tendency towards a typhous form, it is not so difficult 

 to account for the exacerbated manifestations on the intesti- 

 nal canal in some cases he has described, as the result of the 

 depletory and purgative treatment pursued. 



If, however, the most subtle analysis of the opinions of 

 Mortimer and Layard should reveal discrepancies, these we 

 think will be mainly on minor particulars ; and cannot dis- 

 guise the dilemma in which their successors in veterinary 

 pathology are placed, who have by hasty deductions formed 



* The distempers of 1711 and 1745, as malignant and contagions epizootics, may find their type 

 in the enzootic disease commonly called quarter-ill or murrain, in which, from bad food, impure 

 water, or other causes, the hepatic or cystic ducts, either separately or conjointly, and in com- 

 bination with the ductus communis choledochus, are obstructed ; producing an enlargement of the 

 gall bladder, and, in connection with a congested affection of the liver, forcing an absorption (by 

 the method of osmose) of vitiated biliary secretions into the blood ; thus inducing the primary 

 symptoms as well as final results of such too copious an infusion of purulent matter. We do not 

 allude to concomitant symptoms, such as the destruction of muscular substance in the glutcei, &c., 

 and the formation of large cells of vitiated blood corpuscles in their places ; neither do we design 

 in presenting in the enzootic form a countertype to the epizootic, to assign a common or any original 

 cause for their separate developments. All such theoretic views must be referred to future 

 scientific investigation. 



