ASTHMA. 471 



Treatment. — Great atteDtion to diet. The food and water 

 should be carefully regulated as to quantity, and be of the best 

 quality. Feeding on bran mashes, containing a few ounces of 

 linseed oil with lime water, has proved serviceable in the practice 

 of Mr. Anderson of Glasgow. A purgative should occasionally 

 be administered, and the alimentary track always kept in proper 

 order. 



The old farriers used to make a supplementary anus for the 

 horse by passing a red-hot iron into the rectum from immedi- 

 ately below the tail, through which a leaden ring was inserted, to 

 keep it patent. There is no need to resort to this barbarous and 

 insane method ; but they supplied a reason for doing it, namely, 

 that the artificial anus allowed the flatus to escape from the 

 bowel easily, and that it did away with the disagreeable sound 

 which accompanies that act when it is naturally performed. 



The symptoms of broken wind may be palliated by all methods 

 which improve the digestion, and by remedies that are calculated 

 to give them tone ; hence arsenic, alkalies, bitters, more especi- 

 ally nux vomica, and the various tonics are serviceable. All 

 mere remedies, however, must be of secondary importance to 

 hygiene and dietetics. 



" Horse-coupers " resort to various methods for relieving the 

 breathing of broken-winded horses. These persons know well 

 enough that the animal breathes moderately well when the 

 stomach is empty ; they therefore take good care to keep it 

 sliort both of food and water, and give it a sharp trot to unload 

 the bowels. Shot, lard, gunpowder, opium, and other remedies 

 are then poured down its unoffending throat, and most of these 

 remedies seem to exercise a sedative or " stilHng " effect, and 

 the unwary purchaser only knows too late how cleverly he him- 

 self has been " sold." 



There is one consolation, if not for the buyer, at least for the 

 public generally, and that is, broken wind, like many other dis- 

 eases the results of ignorance, is fast becoming a thing of the 

 past. 



LEAD POISOXIXG — LEAD PALSY — PLUMBISM. 



Bejlnitioii. — A series of morbid phenomena induced by the 

 absorption of the salts of lead contained in solution in the 

 drinking water or in the food. 



