THE MODERN HORSE DOCTOR. 183 



Treatment of Periodic Ophthalmia. — The first thing to be 

 done, is to place the patient in a situation where he shall be as 

 free as possible from exciting causes ; the treatment may then be 

 conducted with a ray of hope. Even should the animal be the 

 recipient of hereditary predisposition, his removal from a crowded 

 stable to the country reduces him, as it were, to a state of nature, 

 and tells wonderfully in view of both palliation and cure. 



Antiphlogistic measures, such as topical and general blood- 

 letting, purgatives, &c, are usually resorted to in the treatment 

 of common ophthalmia, and sometimes with remarkable success ; 

 but in a disease of this character, they are worse than useless. 

 And lest this our opinion should appear singular, we quote from 

 Hippopathology, p. 97 : "Blood has been drawn from the jugular 

 vein of the same side as the affected eye, until the animal has 

 quite staggered under the evacuation ; the carotid artery of that 

 side has been stopped by ligature ; nay, the vessels carrying on 

 the inflammation, themselves, as they ran upon the cornea, have 

 been severed by scarification and by cauterization, and all to no 

 other purpose than that of checking, or, to appearance, subduing 

 an inflammatory action, which has been, after a time, sure to return 

 with equal or even with redoubled force. A common inflamma- 

 tion, once fairly conquered, has no power to revive again; at 

 least not in its original activity ; but as for the inflammation of 

 periodic ophthalmia, it will return again and again, after having 

 been, to appearances, overpowered ; and, in opposition to our 

 most strenuous endeavors, will march slowly or rapidly on, accord- 

 ing as the case happens to be acute or chronic, to the ultimate 

 destruction of the eye." 



Purgative medicine, also, which has been so highly extolled for 

 the cure of conjunctival ophthalmia, has generally failed to ben- 

 efit the patient: from these facts alone the reader may form 

 some idea of the disadvantages under which a medical man 

 labors while treating so formidable a malady. Hence we place 

 very little reliance in the antiphlogistic treatment, but have great 

 confidence in the means which God and Nature have provided for 

 the maintenance of health, and for its restoration when absent. 

 We therefore recommend the reader to study that branch of 

 medicine — hygiene — which treats of the preservation of health ; 



