1 16 Management and Treatmeiit of the Horse. 



diminished volume of the pulse, and contracted 

 pupils. • 1 well recollect Professor Spooner say- 

 ing that belladonna was unequalled as a sedative, 

 for you have two objects in view in administer- 

 ing itj it being the best sedative and also a laxa« 

 tive, which power no other sedative possesses. 

 Mr. Brown says of aconite that, given with 

 caution in small doses and well diluted, it has 

 proved in his experience the best sedative, and 

 stands pre-eminent as a diuretic. Mtrate of 

 potass, given repeatedly in water, possesses the 

 property of destroying or neutralizing certain 

 morbid poisons existing in the blood, as well as 

 in a less marked manner of checking inflamma- 

 tion, which result is attributed, at least in part, to- 

 its well-known property of rendering the fibrine 

 of the blood more soluble. In laminitis, cold 

 water should be poured with great force upon 

 the feet, as they are hot and dry ; it reduces the 

 temperature, lowers the circulation, and soothes 

 the nervous system, diminishes the extreme 

 sensibility, and restores the contractility of the 

 capillary vessels, thereby preventing any further 

 effusion, and allowing the absorbent vessels to 

 remove any fluid that may have been thrown out. 

 In this disease the functions of the stomach and 

 digestive organs are either primary or sympa- 

 thetically impaired, and the assimilation of nutri- 

 ment consequently very feeble; it becomes a 

 necessity to supply such concentrated forms of 

 nutriment as will be most certain and readily 

 absorbed by the digestive organs. I have often 

 given two or three eggs in half a pint of cold 



