DISEASES OF THE GLANDS. 141- 



"Improper stable management we believe to be a far more 

 frequent cause of glanders than contagion. The air which 

 ia necessary to respiration is changed and empoisoned in its 

 passage through the lungs, and a fresh supply is necessary 

 for the support of life. That supply may be sufficient barely 

 to support life, but not to prevent the vitiated air from again 

 and again passing into the lungs, and producing irritation 

 and disease The membrane of the nose, possessed of ex- 

 treme sensibility for the purposes of smell, is easily "irritated 

 by this poison, and close and ill-ventilated stables oftenest 

 witness the ravages of glanders. Professor Coleman relates 

 a case which proves to demonstration the rapid and fatal 

 agency of this cause. * In the expedition to Quiberen, the 

 horses had not been long on board the transports, before it 

 became necessary to shut down the hatchways for a few 

 hours ; the consequence of this was, that some of the horses 

 were suffocated, and that all the rest were disembarked 

 either glandered or farcied.' 



'* In a close stable the air is not only poisoned, by being re- 

 peatedly breathed, but there are other and more powerful 

 sources of mischief. The dung and the urine are suffered to 

 remain, fermenting and giving out injurious gases. In many 

 dark and ill-managed stables, a portion of the dung may be 

 swept away, but the urine lies for days at the bottom of the 

 bed, the disgusting and putrifying nature of which is ill -con- 

 cealed by a little fresh straw, which the lazy housekeepei 

 scatters over the top. 



"The stables of gentlemen are generally kept hot enough, 

 and far too hot, although in many of them a more rational 

 mode of treatment is beginning to be adopted ; but they are 

 lofty and roomy, and the horses are not too much crowded 

 together, and a most scrupulous regard is paid to cleanli- 

 ness. Glanders seldom prevail there. The stables of the 

 farmer are ill-managed and filthy enough, and the ordure and 

 urine sometimes remain from week to week, until the horse 

 lies on a perfect dung-hill. Glanders seldom prevail there; 

 for the same carelessness which permits the filth to accumu- 



