366 ENZOOTIC AND EPIZOOTIC DISEASES. 



persons from keeping horses, and hence we find that many whose 

 business requires that horses should be employed, prefer to let 

 out their work to contractors and carriers. This repugnance to 

 purchase and keep horses by men in business has also been in- 

 creased by the great mortality which has generally resulted from 

 this epizootic. 



SEMIOLOGY. 



The primary symptoms are very often more or less obscure. 

 The animal is dull, dejected, off its food, performs ordinary 

 labour with difficulty ; lassitude, perspiration, and fatigue are 

 easily induced. Examined carefully, the pulse will number 

 from sixty up to eighty per minute — during some seasons eighty 

 has been the common number — and the animal temperature will 

 vary from 104° to 106°. Sometimes there is a cough from the 

 commencement ; very often, however, there is no cough during 

 the first three or four days. The extremities and ears are alter- 

 nately hot and cold ; the appetite is almost entirely lost ; the 

 alvine and urinary secretions are defective ; the visible mucous 

 membrane injected, and frequently of a rusty tinge ; in some 

 cases there is a rash in the mouth, a rusty or straw-coloured 

 discharge from the nostrils. The animal does not lie down, 

 Auscultation does not reveal much at first ; in fact, for three 

 or four days the animal may be said to be suffering from 

 fever witliout local complications, but at the end of that period 

 a hard, dry, painful cough is now and then heard ; the thoracic 

 walls are fixed ; the breathing is abdominal ; the elbows are 

 turned out, and a line or hollow extends from the ensiform car- 

 tilage of the sternum to the anterior spine of the ileum, which 

 denotes that the ribs are fixed, owing to pain within the chest. 

 If the horse is now made to move suddenly, it emits a grunt or 

 groan ; in some instances it groans at each expiration, and if 

 slightly rapped in the chest with the knuckles it will do so 

 with j)ain ; the breathing is catching and short, and auscultation 

 will detect a friction sound. — (See Pleurisy.) Very commonly 

 the right side only is affected, in some cases the left, and in rare 

 instances both sides. 



In the course of the next ensuing two days, the sounds of 

 the chest indicate pleurisy, pleuro-pneumonia, or a complica- 

 tion of tliese with pericarditis. From the commencement of the 



