CATARACT. Ill 



3. " Should you not consider the cataract, or the diseased action which 

 caused the cataract, to be in the eye or in the system on the day the horse 

 was sold by Mr. Croft ?" 



" It is my opinion that the diseased action^ the predisposing cause, must have 

 existed previously to the first named jieriod" viz., the day of sale. 



" Mr. Croft's horse afterwards came into the possession of Mr. Watson, a 

 surgeon in Ellesmere, who disposed of him this summer, and he had then no 

 cataract luhatever (as I have been informed), his eyes being perfectly sound 

 in every respect. Now it appears to me," continues Mr. Cartwright, " that 

 this was a case of capsular cataract; yet, when or how it was formed, I can- 

 not say ; but from the testimony of Mr. Croft, who is a very respectable gen- 

 tleman, and in the medical profession, and who, I believe, bred the horse ; and 

 also from that of his bailiff and groom, and that of the colt-breaker who broke 

 him in, who all assert that they never saw the horse with inflamed eyes, we 

 must suppose that he never had any apparent attacks of inflammation, such 

 as to produce cataract; and I am also induced to come to this conclusion 

 from having seen, since that time, two other similar cases, which I will now 

 relate : — 



" The first was a chestnut horse, five years old, the property of Mr. Hort, 

 in this town (Whitchurch), which had two cataracts in each eye : two of them 

 were about the size of large pins' heads, the other two treble that size : his 

 eyes were perfectly transparent, with the above exceptions, and did not shew 

 the least vestige of former inflammation, and which the person that bred him 

 said he had never been subject to. Mr. Hort sold him, about the month of 

 December 1831, to a Mr. Dawson, of Burleydam, with these catarcts evident 

 enough ; but from that time they gradually disappeared^ and in the autumn 

 1832 there was not the least to be seen of them. I saw him a few days ago, 

 when his eyes were perfectly sound." 



" The other case is a five-year-old black cob mare, the property of Mr. 

 Wray, of Ightfield Heath (four miles from this place), who purchased her of 

 a Mr. Pownall, of Darliston, some time in 1832. In November of the same 

 year I saw her, and detected a cataract in the right eye, and of the size of a 

 coriander seed. I then advised him to get rid of her, thinking that she would 

 go blind ; but, being a very useful thing, he kept her. In August 1833 I saw 

 her again, when the cataract had disappeared, and her eyes were perfect. 

 I have spoken to Mr. Pownall respecting her, who informed me that he had 

 never seen any thing the matter with her eyes ; and Mr. Wray says, he 

 never did, with the exception of the cataract." 



" I believe it is the opinion of veterinary surgeons and authors generally, 

 that cataracts never form without previous inflammation ; and English 

 authors, I think, are totally silent respecting the disappearing of them when 

 formed." 



"Mr. Blaine says, 'that cataract never appears in the human subject as 

 a distinct disease, independent of active inflammation or ophthalmia.' " 



