61 



BRONCHOCELE. 



By bronchocele is meant hypertrophy, or a state of enlarge- 

 ment of the thyroid gland. ^ It is a disease which is rarely 

 seen in horses. I have met with only three or four in- 

 stances. In cattle and sheep it is likewise uncommon ; but 

 among swine and dogs it is comparatively frequent; and 

 still more so, it would appear, in our own species, and in 

 women in particular, about the age of puberty : a circum- 

 stance which has induced surgeons to believe it to be con- 

 nected with uterine derangement. It is an old and well- 

 established observation, that certain countries and localities 

 are favorable to its production. In England, Derbyshire and 

 Nottinghamshire have obtained this repute; on the Conti- 

 nent, Switzerland, the Tyrol, Valley of the Rhone, and 

 others ; and to that extent, to lead us at once to the conclu- 

 sion, that influence of soil, or climate, or both, must have 

 much to do with its production : an influence to which, we 

 are assured by the French — who call it goitre — animals are 

 more or less amenable. Old medical writers ascribe its 

 appearance in particular persons to that convenient fons et 

 oriyo, "a scrofulous habit.''^ Of late years, the disease has 

 been thought to be hereditary ; and so strong has appeared 

 the evidence of this in dogs, that Youatt^s forcible ex- 

 pression on this point is, ^' I am quite assured that it is 

 hereditary.^^ 



In Hokses, we pretend to know nothing further about it 

 than that a tumour, seldom of any great magnitude, makes 

 its appearance in the throat, just below the part we grasp to 

 excite coughing, either directly in front or inclining to one 

 side, having a circular or an ovoid form, and feeling soft and 

 puff'y and moveable, without any flinching or sensibility 

 being evinced by the animal when pressing or squeezing it, 

 and without being the occasion of the slightest inconvenience 

 or disparagement to him, save what may be considered to 



' For a description of this gland consult my ' Anatomy of the Horse.' Its 

 connection with the trachea being intimate, will account for its diseases being 

 considered in this place. 



