CHAPTER LVI. 



SPORADIC DISEASES— continued. 



LOCAL DISEASES— con^mwed 



(M.) DISEASES OF THE DIGESTIVE ORGANS. 



With very rare exceptions, diseases of the digestive apparatus 

 are results of errors in feeding. Some of them have been already 

 discussed under the head of Dietetic Diseases, and need not again 

 be referred to. I may here, however, briefly observe that horses 

 are best kept in health and working condition when fed upon 

 an admixture of food requiring thorough mastication, and that 

 horned cattle are best kept in health when, in addition to the 

 more nutritious aliments, they are freely supplied with food 

 requiring remastication, such as hay, grass, or straw. 



Observations on the diseases of digestive organs point to 

 the conclusion that in the horse the intestines are more liable 

 to suffer from disease than the stomach ; whilst in the ox and 

 sheep the reverse is the case ; and in the dog, consequent upon 

 its power of vomition, the stomach is more rarely disordered 

 than one would be led to expect from the nature of its food, &c. 



In the horse the stomach is a simple organ, small in comparison 

 to the size of the animal, and in contrast with the volume of the 

 intestines. It is but slightly called into action during the diges- 

 tive process, and provided the food be properly masticated and 

 incorporated with the salivary secretions, it is arrested for a short 

 time only in the stomach, but is passed onward into the intestinal 

 canal, where the process of digestion is completed. On this ac- 

 count the intestines are more liable to disease. It is also a remark- 

 able fact that easily digested food, if given over-abundantly, is 

 apt to derange the small intestines, whereas food containing much 

 woody fibre, such as over-ripe hay, more particularly rye-grass, 

 coarse straw, &c., accumulates in the large intestines, and there 

 causes derangement, inflammation, and even paralysis of the 

 intestinal muscular tissue. It is also a fact worthy of notice, 

 that if food be given artificially prepared by boiling or steam- 

 ing, it is retained in the stomach itself, and if given over- 



