314 DISEASES OF THE INTESTINES. 



The Symptoms of colic are similar, with two or three 

 notable exceptions, to those denoting painful bowel- affections 

 in general. The attack is sudden. The horse appears to 

 be, all in a moment, seized with a sharp pain in his belly. 

 He commences violently pawing and stamping, and striking 

 his belly with his hind feet. Then, after a few times bending 

 his knees and crouching his body, and advancing his hind 

 feet underneath him in attempts to lie down, he at last drops 

 rather than lies down, issuing a sort of grunt from the fall, 

 and following that up by rolling upon his back, and 

 endeavouring every time he turns up to balance himself in 

 the supine position ; though generally he is unable to ac- 

 complish this until his legs in rolling happen to come 

 against the side of his stall or box. When once he has 

 succeeded in getting upon his back, he will, with his feet 

 drawn downward upon his belly, and his head and neck, 

 perhaps, curved to one side, remain quiet for a minute or 

 two together : this posture appearing to afford him tem- 

 porary relief. On other occasions, after several ineffectual 

 endeavours to roll upon his back, he will suddenly rise again, 

 and, having given himself a shake, as it were to get rid of 

 the straws or dust about him, stand so quiet for a time that 

 he appears by his rolling and struggling to have rid himself 

 of his pain. Soon again, however, he averts his head and 

 anxiously looks back at his flank, with his ears down and an 

 expression in his eye, seeming to say, " There lies my pain, 

 and now I feel it returning again." Each successive fit or 

 paroxysm turns out commonly to be longer and more violent 

 than the one preceding. Early in the disease, the re- 

 missions from pain, or intervals of ease, are evident enough ; 

 but as the case proceeds, the paroxysms growing longer and 

 the remissions shorter, after a time they become altogether 

 unobservable. The unremitting pain the animal at this time 

 is suffering, occasioning continual action and convulsion of 

 body, sets him heaving at the flaiaks, and causes him to 

 break out into a profuse perspiration : drops of sweat stand 

 upon his brows and eyelashes, and every hair in his coat 

 becomes wet through it. The next change, should his 



