26 DISEASES OF THE AIR-PASSAGES. 



are dilated to their utmost extent^ the uose is protruded^ and 

 the neck is carried in a line with the back— the flanks heave 

 with most excessive violence^ and every time the poor beast 

 inspires air, a sound is emitted which will vary in its cha- 

 racter and intensity according to the rigour of the spasm. 

 Sometimes it will be loud and shrill ; sometimes a kind of 

 scream; at other times like a loud twang from a trumpet/^ &c._, 

 At last, the spasm is either suddenly relieved, which is very 

 rarely the case, or he falls very heavily to the ground, 

 struggles for a few moments, and then dies completely 

 asphyxiated. 



The treatment of laryngitis is to be the same as that 

 adopted for catarrh, with this exception, that the throat must 

 be the part to which all local means are to be directed. In 

 mild cases we may be content with fomentation and poultices, 

 succeeded or alternated by giving all the encouragement in 

 our power, through steaming, &c., to discharges from the nose. 

 But in violent and dangerous cases nothing is so efi'ectual as 

 outward stimulation ; blisters, and in particular the mustard 

 poultice. In all cases of chronic swelling, with thickening 

 and hardening of parts above the throat, and especially where 

 there is any disposition to become protracted or chronic, 

 nothing tends to bring about a crisis of some sort sooner 

 than a blister. 



Purgation would be serviceable could it be managed ; but, 

 in these cases, in general, we are debarred from administer- 

 ing medicine by the mouth. When foiled in that, the best 

 plan we can adopt is, by frequent clystering, to keep the 

 bowels at least in a soluble condition. 



An attack of spasm could be met at the moment with no 

 other remedy save the operation of tracheotomy. No time 

 must be lost in slitting open the trachea at a convenient place 

 and inserting into the aperture the tracheotomy tube.^ 



' This tube is dcsciibcd in vol. I of the ' Hippopathology.' 



