370 DISEASES OF THE INTESTINES. 



in one of these fits, tlie animal, harassed and exhausted by 

 continual irritation and ejection of aliment, expires. 



The Cause — the ordinary one — of dysentery, is long- 

 sojourn in low, wet, marshy pastures. I have already shewn 

 that such situations cause worms to be bred or produced in 

 the body ; I have also remarked that lousiness is a frequent 

 concomitant of poverty and hide-bound, states consequent on 

 the emaciation occasioned by dysentery. I once received a 

 horse from Plumstead Marshes to treat, who was dysenteric, 

 verminous, hide-bound, and lousy, and withal, in a state of 

 great debility. Other causes, however, may produce the dis- 

 ease. A diarrhoea, grown chronic and of long continuance, 

 may terminate in dysentery. Food of bad quality ; water of 

 a noxious kind ; exposure to sudden changes even, in horses 

 of weak fibre and irritable bowels, may tend to its produc- 

 tion. In situations where any of these causes are prevalent, 

 diarrhoea or dysentery may arise and assume the appearance 

 of infectious or contagious diseases ; but — to repeat what I 

 said before — they, neither of them, are in anywise commu- 

 nicable from one horse to another, in the manner that dy- 

 sentery is said to be from one man to another. 



Treatment. — The rarity of these cases, together with the 

 little notice they have received, as distinct from diarrhoea, 

 will account for the little we are able to derive from expe- 

 rience in regard to their management. Were there any 

 signs of inflammation in the bowels — any manifestations of 

 pain or even of uneasiness in them — providing the condition 

 and strength of the animal admitted of it, I would bleed ; 

 but not to a large amount — say three or four quarts. Clichi, 

 a French veterinarian, recommends the application of cup- 

 ping-glasses to the anus : the comparatively small quantity of 

 blood, however, known to be capable of being thus abstracted, 

 too-ether with the distance between the anus and colon, are 

 circumstances which must render such practice, I should 

 imagine, next to nugatory. The next thing to be done is to 

 clear out the bowels ; and the only medicine we have for 

 this purpose is aloes, which — though on some accounts ob- 

 jectionable — appears to be demanded to accomplish so desir- 



