440 DISEASES OF THE LIVER AND SPLEEN. 



the liver in inflammation; though he acknowledges it a very 

 embarrassing question to decide whether the paraph^enitis be 

 primitive or secondary. In either case the malady has re- 

 ceived the name of mal de feu ou d''Espagne, probably from 

 its prevalence in that country. During a campaign it will 

 attack numbers of military horses at the same time, and 

 assume quite a formidable aspect. There will be high 

 fever; sharp pain at the bottom of the chest, particularly 

 during inspiration; orthopnoea; depression; despondency. 

 The horse hangs his head low ; heedlessly throws himself 

 about ; strikes the ground with his fore feet ; shakes him- 

 self: dashes his head about; bites at every thing around 

 him ; often regards his flank ; tears pieces even out of his 

 own body; rears himself into the manger, and seizes with 

 his teeth the bars of the rack, and thus maintains himself. 

 In some cases the conjunctive membranes turn faintly 

 yellow. This dreaded malady almost invariably ends in 

 death. 



The Treatment consists in prompt and copious blood- 

 lettings; in the application of blisters to the temples as well 

 as to the region of the liver : also of ice or cold lotions to 

 the head; and in the administration of such medicines in- 

 ternally as are acknowledged antiphlogistics. 



CHRONIC HEPATITIS.— Although the dissection of 

 dead horses furnishes us with ample evidence of the occa- 

 sional existence of inflammation of the liver in a chronic 

 form, still it is a disease whose presence during life is apt to 

 be veiled in much obscurity ; if not, indeed, passed over 

 altogether unobserved. 



Softening of the substance of the liver is a change by 

 no means uncommon, and one which we believe to be con- 

 sequent on inflammation ; and yet we seldom obtain any 

 knowledge of the disease until after death. The liver is 

 found paler than ordinary — clay-coloured, and evidently 

 contains an inordinate quantity of bile ; at the same time it 

 is so soft (or ^^ rotten,^^ as the farriers express it) in its texture 

 that but slight force is required to thrust the finger through 

 its substance. 



