02 MEMBRANE OF THE NOSE. 



ances will be guides to our opinion and treatment, which we can never too highly 

 ajipreciate. 



CATARRH, OR COLD. 



Catarrh, or Culd, is attended by a slight defluxion from the nose — now and tlien, a 

 slighter weeping from the eyes, and some increased labour of breathing, on account 

 of the uneasiness which the animal experiences from the passage of the air over the 

 naturally sensitive, and now more than usually irritable surface, and from the air- 

 passage being diminished by a thickening of the membrane. When this is a simply 

 local inflammation, attended by no loss of appetite or increased animal temperature, 

 it may speedily pass over. 



In many cases, however, the inflammation of a membrane naturally so sensitive, 

 and rendered so morbidly irritable by our absurd treatment, rapidly spreads, and 

 involves the fauces, the lymphatic and some of the salivary glands, the throat, the 

 parotid gland, and the membrane of the larynx. We have then increased discharge 

 from the nose, greater redness of the membrane of the nose, more defluxion from the 

 eyes, and loss of appetite, from a degree of fever associating itself with the local 

 alfection ; and there also being a greater or less degree of pain in the act of swallow- 

 ing, and which, if the animal feels this, he will never cat. Cough now appears more 

 or less frequent or painful ; but with no great acceleration of the pulse, or heaving 

 of the flanks. 



Catarrh may arise from a thousand causes. Membranes, subjected to so many 

 sources of irritation, soon become irritable. Exposure to cold or rain, change of 

 stable, change of weather, change of the slightest portirn of clothing, neglect of 

 grooming, and a variety of circumstances apparently trifling, and which they who 

 are unaccustomed to horses would think could not possibly produce any injurious 

 effect, are the causes of catarrh. In the spring of the year, and while moulting, a 

 great many young horses have cough ; and in the dealers' stables, where the process 

 of making up the horse for sale is carrying on, there is scarcely one of them that 

 escapes this disease. 



In the majority of cases, a few warm mashes, warm clothing, and a warm stable — a 

 fvver-ball or two, with a drachm of aloes in each, and a little antimony in the evening, 

 will set all right. Indeed, all would soon be right without any medicine ; and much 

 more speedily and perfectly than if the cordials, of which grooms and farriers are so 

 fond, had been given. Nineteen horses out of twenty with common catarrh will do 

 well; but in the twentieth case, a neglected cough may be the precursor of bronchitis, 

 and pneumonia. These chest affections often insidiously creep on, and inflammation 

 is frequently established before any one belonging to the horse is aware of its exist- 

 ence. If there is the least fever, the horse should be bled. A common cold, attended 

 by heat of the mouth or indisposition to feed, should never pass without the abstrac- 

 tion of blood. A physic-ball, however, should not be given in catarrh without much 

 consideration. It can scarcely be known what s}'mpathy may exist between the por- 

 tion of membrane already affected, and the mucous membranes generally. In severe 

 thoracic affection, or in that wliich may soon become so, a dose of physic would be 

 little better than a dose of poison. If. however, careful investigation renders it evi- 

 dent that there is no affection of the lungs, and that the disease has not proceeded 

 beyond the fauces, small doses of aloes may with advantage be united with other 

 medicines, in order to evacuate the intestinal canal, and reduce the faecal discharge to 

 a pultaceous form. 



If catarrh is accompanied by sore throat ; if the parotids should enlarge and 

 become tender — there are no tonsils, a7iiyirdrilw, in the liorsc — or if the suiunaxillary 

 a;lands should be inflamed, and the animal should quid his food and gulp liis water, 

 this will be an additional reason for bleeding, and also for warm clothing and a com- 

 fortable stable. A hot stable is not meant by the term comfortable, in which the foul 

 air is breathed over and over again, but a temperature some degrees above that of the 

 external air, and whore that determination to the skin and increased action of the 

 exhalent vessels, which in these c; ses are so desirable, may take ])lace. Every stable, 

 both for horses in sickness and in health, should have in it a tliermometer. 



Some stimulating liniment may be applied over the inflamed gland, consisting of 

 turpentine or tincture of cantliarides, diluted with spermaceti or neat's-foot oil — strong 

 enough to produce considerable irritation en the skin, but not to blister, cr to destroy 



