APOPLEXY FROM CONGESTION. 521 



this fatal malady ; hence, in feeding an animal of this kind, great 

 care should be taken that the food be not over-abundant, too 

 highly nitrogenous, or too watery. A previous attack of par- 

 turient apoplexy also predisposes to a second, and generally fatal 

 attack of the malady. 



The exciting causes may be looked for in the act of parturi- 

 tion itself, mistake in the dietary, and in the season of the year. 



In rare instances, parturient apoplexy occurs during or imme- 

 diately prior to the birth of the calf ; but almost invariably the 

 first symptoms are not manifested before the lapse of some 

 hours — from twenty to twenty-four hours is a very critical 

 period — or even two or three days after parturition. 



When symptoms of the malady are not manifested for some 

 time after the birth of the calf, it will generally be found that 

 the secretion of the mammary gland has been in an average, or 

 even abundant quantity, that the appetite has been good, and 

 rumination naturally performed. Premonitory to other symp- 

 toms, it is generally seen that the secretion of milk is suspended. 



The arrest of the lactiferous secretion is doubtless due to some 

 disturbance of the organic system of nerves, but how this arises 

 it is difficult to determine, unless we take into consideration 

 that the great sympathetic is developed to a greater extent in 

 deep milkers than in other cattle, and that in consequence it is 

 more susceptible, and more prone to derangement from trivial 

 causes, especially at this critical period. 



In the natural or healthy condition, the blood required for 

 the support of the fcetus in utero is diverted after the parturition 

 into the mammary gland, for the purpose of supplying material 

 for the formation of milk. One portion of the ganglionic system 

 is thus brought into increased action, whilst that which durimr 

 the pregnancy had been developed in the uterus, being no longer 

 required, falls into a condition of at least temporary atrophy. 



If we bear in mind that the blood required to support the 

 foetus prior to its birth is diverted, as it were, in the healthy 

 state to the mammary gland, when the mother is delivered, in 

 order to supply material for the secretion of milk ; and if, in 

 addition to the arrest of the lactiferous secretion, the various 

 excretory organs cease to perform their functions, it can be 

 easily understood how the whole vascular system becomes pre- 

 ternaturallv engorged or congested. Such then is the condition 



