CATARRH. 15 



surgeons and veterinary surgeons are apt to be misled by it, 

 so that nothing short of actual inspection of the case can or 

 ought to satisfy the medical adviser. A groom will report 

 to his master that his horse has *^ only a cold/' when the 

 animal is probably labouring under an attack of bronchitis 

 or pneumonia ; and will declare a paroxysm of specific oph- 

 thalmia to be but " a cold in his eye /' and do this, not from 

 any desire to conceal the truth, but from pure consciousness 

 of the rectitude of his report. Many a life, and still more 

 eyes, have been lost from veterinary aid being deferred or 

 kept aloof after this specious manner. 



Causes. Such as are called py-edisposing may be said to 

 lurk or arise in horses of from three to five years of age; who 

 have been recently stabled, particularly at certain seasons, 

 spring and autumn, and in such as are very wet or variable. 

 Horses who are pampered, warmly clothed in stables, will be 

 more likely to contract colds than others living, unclothed, 

 in cool or cold stables ; and if in the open air altogether 

 they may be said to be hardly susceptible of catarrh at all. 



The exciting causes may be said often to be connected 

 with the states and vicissitudes of weather : cold and wet being 

 seasons apt to produce as well as predispose to the disease. 



The very appellation of " cold'' for this disorder has evi- 

 dently sprung from the circumstance of its production being 

 commonly connected with exposure to diminished tempera- 

 ture : though cold seems oftener but the predisposing cause; 

 the ordinary excitement appearing to be heat. It is not usual 

 for horses which are turned out, even though exposed to every 

 inclemency of weather, to take cold ; but it is very common 

 after they have been taken up and put into stables, and espe- 

 cially when the stables prove to be warm ones, to be seen 

 falling amiss. It is much oftener the transition from cold to 

 heat than from heat to cold that generates catarrh : in a 

 general way, horses may be taken out of their warm stables 

 and turned into cold situations (provided they are not exposed 

 to wet) without anything like the risk incurred from the re- 

 verse treatment. I differ however in opinion with Professor 

 Coleman when he says that horses never suffer from exposure 



