THE MODERN HORSE DOCTOR. 19 



What do we know practically of the cause and nature of the 

 various forms of influenza, commonly called pink eye, horse aiU 

 &c. ? The same may be said of milk sickness, pleuro-pneumonia, 

 and many other diseases that we might name. We know noth- 

 ing — absolutely nothing. 



Milk sickness is a disease that at times prevails in the West- 

 ern States, to such an alarming extent, attended with such a 

 frightful mortality, that it has served as a cause to disband a whole 

 community. A reward of several thousand dollars has been 

 offered by legislative authority, to be given to that individual who 

 shall first discover and make known the cause of the disease. 



But the reward has never, to the author's knowledge, been 

 claimed. Diseases of the lungs are so rife in the United States, 

 that, if we except old age, two thirds, or perhaps one half, of the 

 losses experienced by owners of stock in the death of horses and 

 cattle, result from diseased lungs. 



Pneumonia is a common form of disease among horses, and great 

 skill and discretion are needed in order to bring it to a favorable 

 termination, for it often laughs to scorn the puny efforts of man, 

 however well directed. It requires the very best skill for its 

 treatment, because the organ involved is one whose function 

 gives life and action to all the other organs. It performs the 

 very last act of digestion, which is the decarbonization of the 

 blood ; and modern physiologists inform us that the lungs play a 

 more important part in the circulation of the blood through the 

 arterial ramifications than the heart itself; which has heretofore 

 been considered the only source of circulation. Be this as it 

 may, no organ, when deranged, requires so much skill in its early 

 stage as this — early, because the delay of a few hours may 

 prove fatal. A -mistake in the diagnosis, or a wrong medicine 

 administered, tnay place the patient beyond the aid of man. 



You may call en the veterinary surgeon in the latter stages 

 of the disease, and, as often happens, after the patient has been 

 pretty well dosed ; but it is too late ; the animal has passed the 

 Rubicon, and has entered within the boundaries of the valley of 

 death. 



It is necessary, therefore, to be able to detect this disease in 

 its primary form, before it has completely invaded the citadel 



