504 THE DISEASES AND DISORDERS OF THE OX. 



sometimes occurs, being due either to external injury or to 

 extensive ulceration. 



INDIGESTION. 



In the first place, we may remark that nearly all the diseases 

 connected with the digestive system, and especially those we 

 are now about to discuss, viz. indigestion and colic, are as a 

 rule the consequences of errors in diet. In regard to food- 

 supply, one point at least may here be mentioned, and that is 

 that oxen, so far as is possible, should always be supplied with 

 food which requires re-mastication, that is, with hay, grass, or 

 straw, in addition to any more highly nutritious foods used. 



As we previously pointed out, ruminants are more liable to 

 suffer from disorders of the stomach than from disturbance of 

 the functions of the other portions of the alimentary canal, the 

 reason being that the stomach is a very complex and important 

 organ in these animals. Horses, on the contrary, are more 

 frequently troubled with derangements of the actions of the 

 intestines. It should, however, be borne in mind that a sudden 

 or extreme change in the food supply, or any other great error 

 in the dietary, will usually bring on derangements of the work- 

 ing of the stomach, or of the intestines, or of both, in almost 

 any animal whatsoever. Again, the ruminating animals eat 

 and swallow the coarsest food very rapidly, and they are pro- 

 vided with a large receptacle wherein the hastily-devoured food 

 is reduced to smaller particles by a slow churning movement, 

 preparatory to its being chewed over again. Hence the stomach 

 in these animals more actively participates in the process of 

 digestion than in the horse, and is, therefore, as we have said, 

 the more liable to disturbances of various kinds. 



In cases of indigestion in the ox, whether there be or be not 

 any marked engorgement associated therewith, special treatment 

 is requisite. Pepsin may be given to calves suffering from 

 indigestion, when the disorder is due to imperfect secretion 

 of the gastric glands, and it may be remembered that a little 

 common salt given in the food in many cases promotes 

 digestion. 



Simple indigestion, or dropping the cud, may prevail among 

 a whole flock of sheep and a great number of cattle, even 

 extending to the animals on adjoining farms. It seems to be 



