DISEASES OF THE CHEST AND LUNGS. 297 



BO that some diflSculty and an increased rapidity of breathing 

 is the consequence. "After a time, a frothy mucus is 

 poured from the membrane, and this still further interferes 

 with respiration, and necessitates a constant cough to get rid 

 of it. These symptoms are always present ; but they will 

 vary gi^eatly in intensity, and in the" rapidity with which they 

 progress, from which circumstances bronchitis is usually said 

 to be acute or chronic, as the case may be." 



The discharge in bronchitis is mainly of a purulent, mu- 

 cous character, with clots of blood and plugs of matter from 

 the nose. The disease gradually steals its way along the line 

 of the trachea to the air-tubes, and even the substance of the 

 lungs, and the inexperienced will have some difficulty in 

 distinguishing it from pneumonia, which is its very frequent 

 termination. The horse is very sensitive to pain, and his 

 nerves are all alive to excitement. That he feels the full 

 force of his suffering is manifest by his haggard look, and 

 also by his evident dread of suffocation, which causes him to 

 remain standing and motionless. There is a hard, dry cough ; 

 the breathing is hot, and noticeably quickened; the pulse is 

 full and rapid, beating sixty or seventy times per minute, 

 and the membrane of the nose is of a deep florid red. 



When the ear is placed to the throat and chest, (which is 

 that most useful means of forming a true diagnosis of all 

 pulmonary diseases, which the books describe under };he namvj n 

 of auscultation^ there is heard a dry, ratt\ing sound, differing 

 materially from the crepitation — the murmurous, crackling 

 sound — of pneumonia. Upon the formation of mucus, this 

 is succeeded by gurgling, and what have been called "soap- 

 bubble sounds," forming a distinctive feature of bronchitis 

 that is easily recognized. 



TREATMENT. 



The treatment of this disease is so nearly identical with 

 that to be prescribed for pneumonia, in the next section, that 

 it will be sufficient to refer the reader forward to that con- 

 nection. 



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