INFLAMMATION OF THE BOWELS— ENTERITIS. 235 



it as soon as the gas has escaped. The wound in the intestines will then probahly 

 close, from the innate elasticity of the parts. 



INFLAMMATION OF THE BOWELS. 



There are two varieties of this malady. The first is inflammation of the external 

 coats of the intestines, accompanied by considerable fever, and usually costiveness. 

 The second is that of the internal or mucous coat, and almost invariably connected 

 with purging. 



ENTERITIS. 



The muscular coat is that which is oftenest affected. Inflammation of the external 

 coats of the stomach, whether the peritoneal or muscular, or both, is a very frequent 

 and fatal disease. It speedily runs its course, and it is of great consequence that its 

 early symptoms should be known. If the horse has been carefully observed, restless- 

 ness and fever will have been seen to precede the attack. In many cases a direct 

 shivering fit will occur: the mouth will be hot, and the nose red. The animal will 

 soon express the most dreadful pain by pawing, striking at his belly, looking wildly 

 at his flanks, groaning, and rolling. The pulse will be quickenad and small ; the 

 ears and legs cold; the belly tender, and sometimes hot; the breathing quickened ; 

 the bowels costive ; and the animal becoming rapidly and fearfully weak. 



The reader will probably here recur to the sketch given in page '233 of the distinc- 

 tion between spasmodic colic and inflammation of the bowels, or enteritis. 



The causes of this disease are, first of all and most frequently, sudden exposure to 

 cold. If a horse that has been highly fed, carefully groomed, and kept in a warm 

 stable, is heated with exercise, and has been during some hours without food, and in 

 this state of exhaustion is suffered to drink freely of cold water, or is drenched with 

 rain, or have his legs and belly washed with cold water, an attack of inflammation 

 of the bowels will often follow. An overfed horse, subjected to severe and long- 

 continued exertion, if his lungs were previously weak, will probably be attacked by 

 inflammation of them ; but if the lungs were sound, the bowels will on the following 

 day be the seat of disease. Stones in the intestines are an occasional cause of inflam- 

 mation, and colic neglected or wrongly treated will terminate in it. 



The horse paws and stamps as in colic, but without the intervals of ease that occur 

 in that disease. The pulse also is far quicker than in colic. The breathing is more 

 hurried, and the indication of suffering more evident. " The next stage," in tlie 

 graphic language of Mr. Percivall, "borders on delirium. The eye acquires a Avild, 

 haggard, unnatural stare — the pupil dilates — his heedless and dreadful throes render 

 approach to him quite perilous. He is an object not only of compas>i<m but of appre- 

 hension, and seems fast hurrying to his end; when, all at once, in the midst of ago- 

 nising torments, he stands quiet, as though every pain had left him, and he v/ere 

 going to recover. His breathing becomes tranquillised — his pulse sunk beyond all 

 perception — his body bedewed with a cold clammy sweat — he is in a tremour from 

 head to foot, and about the legs and ears has even a death-like feel. The mouth feels 

 deadly chill ; the lips drop pendulous; and the eye seems unconscious of objects. In 

 fine, death, not recovery, is at hand. Mortification has seized the inflamed bowel — 

 pain can no longer be felt in that which a few minutes ago was the seat of exquisite 

 suffering. He again becomes convulsed, and in a few more struggles less violent 

 than the former he expires."* 



The treatment of inflammation of the bowels, like that of the lungs, should be pr-^pn^it 

 and energetic. The first and most powerful means of cure will be bleeding. Fr^'a 

 six to eight or ten quarts of blood, in fact as much as the horse can bear, should bs 

 abstracted as soon as possible; and the bleeding repeated to the extent of four or fiv^ 

 quarts more, if the pain is not relieved and the pulse has not become rounder and 

 fuller. The speedy weakness that accompanies this disease should not deter from 

 bleeding largely. That weakness is the consequence of violent inflammation of these 

 parts ; and if that inflammation is subdued by the loss of blood, the weakness will 

 disappear. The bleeding should be effected on the first appearance of the disease, for 

 there is no malady that more quickly runs its course. 



* Percivall's Hippopathology, vol. ii. p. 246. 



