412 



NEW ENta.AM) FAllMEU, 



Kbtars o t CTsctul BnatolrtQC^^^Jarmcrs' Scttcs. 



D^ISEASBS OF HORSES. 



[CmlinucL] 



the nose is llic original seal of glan.lers; tl.at tlie 

 disease is for a lime purely local ; ll.at the mflam- 

 niation of llie tubercles must proceed to suppura- 

 tion before thai matter is formed on which the 

 poisoning of the constitution depends ; that the 

 whole circulation does at lensrih become empoison- 

 ed ; and thai the hor.se is destroyed by the general 



GLANDERS. 



Glandtrs have often been confounde.l with 

 stransrUs, and by those who ought to have known 



better Sirang'le* are peculiar to young horses, irritation and disease produced. 



The early stage resembles common cold, with Glanders may be cither bred in the hot^c,or 



some dcrco of fever and sore throat ; generally communicated by contagion. Whnt we have fur- 



with distressing cough, or at least frequent wheez- ji.gr jo remark on this malady will be arranged 



ing ; and when the enlargement nppcai-s beneath uoJer these two hends- 



the jaw, it is not a single small gland, but a swell- 

 ing of the whole of the substance between the 

 jaws ; growing harder towards the middle ; and 

 after a while appearing to contain a fluid, and 

 breaking. In strangles the membrai.e of the nose 

 will be intensely red, and the discharge from the 

 nose profuse, an<l purulent, or mixeil with mutter 

 almost from the first ; and when the tumor has 

 burst, the fever will abate, and the horse will speed- 

 ily get well. 



Should the discharge from the nose continue for 

 a considerable time after the horse has recovered 

 from strangles, as it sosnetimes doe.*, there is no 

 cause for fear. Simple strangles need never de- 

 generate into glanders. Good keep, and small 

 doses of blue vitriol given internally, will gra- 

 dually make all right. 



(Guilders have been confounded with catarrh 

 or cold, but the distinction between tliem is plain 

 enough. Fever accompanies cold, and loss of 

 appetite, and sore throat (the quidding of the food, 

 and gulping of the water are sufTicient indications 

 of the latter of these ;) the discharge from the 

 iiosi; is profuse, and perhaps purulent ; and the 

 glands under the jaw, if swelled, are moveablo, 

 and there is a thickening around them, nn.l they 

 are tendci and hot. With proper treatment the 

 fever abates ; the cough disappears ; the swellings 

 under the throat subside, and the discharge from 

 the nose gradually ceases, or, if it remain, it is 

 usually very diflTerent from that which character- 

 izes glanders. In glanders, there is seldom cough 

 of any consequence, and, generally, no cough at all. 

 A running from the nose, small in quantity, and 

 from the smallness of its cpiantity drying about 

 the edges of the nostril, ami so presenting some 

 appearance of stickiness, will, in a fevr cases, re- 

 main after severe catarrh, and especially after the 

 influenza of spring ; and these have gradually as- 

 sumed the charucter of glanders, and more par- 

 ticularly when they have been accompanied by 

 enlarged glands and ulceration in the nose. Here 

 the aid of a judicious veterinary surgeon is indis- 

 pensable ; and he perhaps will experience con- 

 Milcrable difliculty in deciding the case. One 

 . ircuinstance will principally guide him. No dis- 

 ease will run on to glanders which has not, to a 

 considerable and paljiable degree, impaired and 

 briiki'ii down the constilution ; and every disease 

 thai Joes this will run on Id f^tnnders. lie will look 

 then to the griicral state and condition of the 

 lior.-ie, as well as to the situation of the glands, the 



Improper stable management we believe to be 

 a far more frequent cause of glanders than conta- 

 gion. The air which is 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 vi- 

 tiated air from again and again passing to the lungs, 

 and producing irritation and disease. The mem- 

 brane of the nose, possessed of extrcimc sensibility 

 for the purposes of smell, is ea.sily irritated by this] 

 poison, and close and ill-ventilated stables ofteii- 

 est witness the ravages of glanders. Professor 

 Coleman relates a case, which proves to demon- 

 stration the rapid and fatal agency of this cause. 

 ' In the expedition to Quiberon, the horses had 

 not been long on board the transports, before i( 

 became necessary to shut down the hatchways 

 (we believe for a few hours only ;) the consequence 

 of this was, that some of them were suffocated, 

 and that all the rest were disembarked either glan-i 

 dered or farcied.'* I 



lu a close stable, the air is not only poisoned by 

 being repeatedly breathed, but there are other and 

 more powerful soucfes of mischief. The dung 

 .•iiirl ibe urine ore- euffered to remain fermenting, 

 and giving out injurious gases. In many dark 

 and ill-managed stables, a portion of the dung 

 may be swejit away, but the urine lies for days at 

 the bottom of the bed, the .lisgusting and putrify- 

 ing nature of which is ill concealed by a little fresh 

 straw which the lazy horsckeeper scatters over 

 the top. 



The stables of the gentleman 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 ; btit they are lofty and 

 roomy, and the horses are not too much crowded 

 together, and a most scrupulous regard is paid to 

 cleanliness. Glanders seldom prevail there. The 

 stables of the farmer. are ill-managed and filthy 

 enough, and the ordure and urine sometimes re- 

 maiirfiom week to week, until the horse lies on 

 a perfect dunghill, while there is no declivity to 

 drain away the moisture, nor any regular pave- 

 iiieiit to prevent it from soaking into the earth, nor 

 any water to clean even the suifuce, but the only 

 instrument of purification is an old stumped brootii. 

 Glanders seldom prevail there ; for the same care- 

 lessness which permits the tilth to accumulate, 

 leaves many a cranny for the wind to enter, and 

 sweep away the deleterious fumes ftom this badly 



Horse, us wen no lo mu MiiKiiiijii «M HI'' ^.«....-, .--■- s\vei;p u«ti> m^ ».i,i.,.....^-- 

 nature of the discharge and character of the f(,nfpj j,nd unceiled place. 



ulceration. | The stables of the horse-dealer arc hot enough; 



The mahiily jirocceds as wo have already de- ' i,„i „ principle of strict cleanliness is enforceil, 

 gcrib'-d it, but before it» termination, becomes con- I f„r (here must be nothing to offend the eye or the 

 nected with farcy. Fow h<irses die of glanders ,^„^^. „f the customer; and their glanders arc sel- 

 without exhibiting some appi«irance of farcy; and ,io,n found: but if the stables of many of our post- 

 farcy, in its latter stages, is almost invariably ac- I i,„rses, ami of those emjiloycd on our canals, be 



companicMl bv glan<lerH : — thei/ are. different forms ; . — — 



or stfin:es of the same disease. I • See Percivars excellent Lectures on the Veterfnary 



There can be no doubt that the membrane of Art, vol.lii. p. -165. 



July 16, 1830. 



examined, nliiiost too low for a tall horse to .stand 

 upright— loo dark for the accumulation of filth 

 to be perceived— too far from the eye of the mas- 

 ter,— ill-drained, and illpaved,— and governed by 

 a false principle of econom\, which begrudges the 

 labor of the man, and the cleanliness and comfort 

 of the animal ;— these will be the very hot-beds 

 of the disease, and in many of these eslablishnients 

 it is an almost constant resident. 



When speaking of ii.flammatio-i of ihc eye, and 

 the elfecl of ill-ventilated stables in producing it, 

 we remarke.l that the urine of the horse contain- 

 ed ail unusually large quantity of hartshorn; that 

 ' the litter wetted by it was disposed most rapidly 

 to ferment, and that the gases extricated must be 

 exlremelv prejudicial to so delicate an organ. It 

 may, then, be easily imagined ihat the constant 

 presence of those pungent ftimcs, and ihe irrita- 

 tion which they would cause on that membrane 

 which is the verv .seat of smell, must predispose 

 for, an.l often generate a disease which is prima- 

 rily an affection of this membrane. 



Glanders may be produced by anything ihat 

 .njnres, or for a length of time acts upon, and 

 weakens the vital energy of this membrane. Phey 

 have been known to follow a fracture of the bones 

 of the nose. Thev have been the consequence 

 of violent catarrh, and particularly the long con- 

 tinued discharge from the nostrils, of which we 

 have spoken. They have been produced by the 

 injection of stimulating an.l acrid substances up 

 the nostril; and everything that weakens the con- 

 stitution generally, will lead to glanders. It is 

 not only from bad stable-management, but from 

 the hardships which they endure, and the exhaust- 

 .,1 state of their constitution, that post and ma- 

 chine-horses are so subject to glanders ; and there 

 is scarcely an inflammatory disease to which the 

 horse is subject, that is not occasionally wound 

 ui) and terminated by the appearance ot glanders. 

 Glandei-s, however, are highly contagious. The 

 farmer cannot be too well aware of this ; and, 

 considering the degree to which they often pre- 

 vail, the legislature would be justified in mlerler- 

 in^ by some severe enactments, as they have done 

 in^the case of the small-pox in the human subject. 

 The early and marked symptom ot glanders is a 

 discharge from the nostrils of a peculiar cliarac- 

 tcr • and if that, even before it becomes purulent, 

 be rubbed on a wound, or on a mucous surface 

 as the nostrils, it will produce a similar disease. 

 Glanders are not communicated by the air or 

 breath. If tlie division between two horses were 

 sufficiently high to prevent all smelling and snort- 

 ing at each other, and contact of every kind and 

 they drunk not out of the same pail, a sound horse 

 might live for years, uninfected, by the side of a 

 .-hindered one. The matter of glanders has been 

 mixed up into a ball, and given to a healthy horse, 

 without etTcct : vet in another experiment-ol the 

 snme kin.l, the poor animal died. The mouth or 

 .'ullel had probably some small wounds or ulcers 

 hi it Sonic horses have eaten ihc hay left by 

 those that were glan.lered, and no bad conse- 

 luence has followed ; but others have been speed- 

 ily infected. The ghin.lerous matter must come 

 in contact with a wound, or fall on some mem- 

 brane, thin and delicate like that of the nose, and 

 through which it may be nb-<orbed. It is easy, 

 then, ncciLstomed as horses are to smell each other 

 and to recognize each other by the smell ; ealiiig 

 out of the same manger, and drinking tr..m the 

 same pail, to imagine that the disease may be 

 very readily communicated. One horse has pass- 



