124 PATHOLOGY. 



intestines in dysentery, and tlie putrid odour exhaled even before 

 death by the bodies of those who are the victims of similar 

 pestilential diseases — are so many proofs of the early triumphs of 

 dead over vital chemistry." — (Williams' Principles of Medicine.) 



Tliis mode of death is not recognised by some writers, but 

 the truth of the above quotation will, I have no doubt, strike 

 many who have witnessed tlie course and progress of the blood 

 diseases of the domesticated animals ; the extensive congestions 

 and extravasations of black, tar-like blood, and its rapid decom- 

 position in sj)lenic apoplexy and quarter-ill ; the gangrenous 

 throat, and sphacelated patches of skin in purpura heemorrhagica 

 and scarlatina; the putrid odour of the secretions and the 

 aphthous patches of rinderpest, and the very general advent of 

 an exhaustive diarrhoea in those cases which do not siiccumb to 

 the shock of the disease ; the peculiar odour exhaled, as well as 

 the rapid decomposition of the whole body after death ; — indeed 

 it may truly be said that decomposition of the blood has set in 

 prior to death in many instances, for if the blood be immediately 

 examined under a high microscopic power, bacteria may be 

 found in great abundance. 



The symptoms of the approach of death by necrfemia are 

 generally as follows : — A dusky livid colour of the visible mucous 

 membranes; slight exanthematous patches on the skin, pete- 

 chial spots — in rinderpest these were thought to be small-pox 

 pustules — or extensive extravasations and the production of a 

 foetid gas subcutaneously ; oozing of a thin sanguineous fluid from 

 the nostrils or intestinal canal, or of blood in a semi-coagulated 

 condition, extreme prostration of strength ; the pulse accelerated, 

 feeble, soft, sometimes presenting a double beat; twitchings of 

 the limbs ; dilatations of the pupils, the eye often fixed and 

 staring, but sometimes with the lids closed ; unequal and 

 frequent respirations ; cold perspiration, and a gradual fall of the 

 animal temperature. The horse will generally stand until the 

 last, and will only fall from prostration ; it will then struggle in- 

 effectually to rise. The cow and sheep, however, will lie down in 

 the earlier stages of disease, and scarcely ever struggle to rise. 



The prognosis in all diseases which tend to terminate in 

 necraemia is seldom or never favourable, but it is generally con- 

 sidered expedient to endeavour to avert the tendency to a fatal 

 termination ; and there are certain considerations which may be 



