DISEASES OCCURRING DURING DENTITION, 515 



roaring. There is, liowever, no danger of that, if the animal be 

 not predisposed by hereditary taint ; but if he is of a stock of 

 roarers, even the irritation of teething may develop the infirmity. 

 The treatment for tins, wliich may be truly called a tooth- 

 cough, is careful dieting on crushed food ; hay, not much bran ; 

 grass, if in season, or roots when grass is not obtainable ; alka- 

 line medicines, more particularly the bicarbonate of soda ; gentle 

 aperients occasionally, if the bowels be irregular, and if the faeces 

 are foetid, the foetor will be much diminished by a few doses of 

 the hyposulphite of soda ; the mouth to be gargled with some 

 cooling mixture, such as the borate of soda or alum. 



DENTITION FEVER (pERCIVALL). 



During the active stages of the process of dentition some 

 horses suffer from a degree of constitutional disturbance, accom- 

 panied by loss of appetite, debility, unthriftiness, a tendency to 

 diarrhoea, and excited pulse, but without cough or any other 

 symptom indicating that the fever is due to disease of any internal 

 organ. On examination of the mouth being made, the gums are 

 found red, swollen, and tender, with the secretion of saliva much 

 increased. Hutrel D'Arboval says : — " A sort of local fever ori- 

 ginates in the alveolar cavities, running high or low according 

 to the resistance the teeth encounter from the hardness of the 

 jaws or their own disproportionate size and solidity. The gums 

 become stretched from the pressure of the teeth against them ; 

 they dilate, sometimes split; at the same time they are red, 

 painful, and hot even to a sense of burning. Internally, the 

 roots of the teeth, from shooting downwards, compress the dental 

 nerves, and painfully drag the periosteal linings of the alveolar 

 cavities. These combined causes will sufficiently account for 

 the local irritation and suffering accompanying teething, and 

 enable us to explain many morbid phenomena we find appearing 

 in horses about this, from various circumstances, the most critical 

 period of their* lives." 



Horses from three to four years old are more subject to this 

 species of dental irritation than those of a more tender age, and 

 it is well known amongst horsemen that horses will stand more 

 fatigue at a more tender age than they wiU at tlris ; and the 

 reason is to be found in the fact that dentition is now at the 



