RUPURK OF THE LIVER-— HEPATIRRHCEA. 447 



first, but shortly becoming profuse and destructive to life. 

 Cases now and then occur which give us room to think that 

 partial bursts takes place, and the horse lives for days, or even, 

 supposing he is not at work, for weeks afterwards. The 

 coagulum retained in the rent by the peritoneum, becoming 

 firm, and in some cases semi-organised, operates for the time 

 as an essential stay to fresh haemorrhage. The question, 

 in these cases, almost all of them in old horses, appears to 

 arise, whether the liver be not the subject, in the first instance, 

 of local plethora or congestion, and subsequently, in the 

 course of time, of disease, arising out of that condition ; which, 

 through absorption of the colouring, and serous parts of the 

 blood, gradually turns out to be the foundation of that 

 morbid change of the gland which consists in a clayey sof- 

 tened, disorganised state, and sometimes granular condition, 

 we in practice designate by the phrase " rotten/^ The liver, 

 we are in the habit of saying, was found '^ as rotten as a pear.'' 

 In this way it is that — 



Enlargement of the Liver takes place, to such enor- 

 mous bulk as is by several of our profession recorded. Mr. 

 Field mentions a case in which liver had increased to 421b. 

 Mr. Henderson (Yet. 1846) found the gland to weigh 55 lb. 

 In the case of J. Field's (from which the symptoms were 

 taken at page 327), the right lobe of the liver had burst : 

 still, the gland weighed 42 lbs. 



In a case of disease of the heart and liver, related by Mr. 

 Henderson, jun., in the Veterinarian for April 1846, the 

 liver was enormously enlarged, weighing 55 lbs. (Vide case 

 of F 5. 'Reg. Record of Sick,' page 228, occurring in 

 August 1852.) 



Chronic hepatitis is a disease so obscure and insidious in 

 its course, that horses in general have it without any know- 

 ledge on our part of its existence : in fact, we rarely know 

 anything about it until the subject of it comes to die, perhaps 

 from ruptured liver, and we find the gland clay-coloured, 

 softened, and so rotten in texture that it will hardly bear 

 handling without falling to pieces. Supposing, however, the 

 liver to continue sound under these predisposing causes to 



