STRANGLES. 457 



what abated, support the pendant parts by means of band- 

 ages. 



STRANGLES 



Are evidently of febrile origin. The late Mr. Castley thus 

 notices this singular equine affection : " Often when a 

 young horse is looking sickly, delicate, or thriftless, farmers 

 or breeders will say, ' he is breeding the strangles,' or that 

 ' strangles hang about him,' and that he will not get better 

 until he gets over that complaint." There is much truth 

 in this observation, and some breeders are particularly ex- 

 pert at catching the first premonitory symptoms. The 

 affection has been divided into true and bastard strangles. 

 There is, moreover, no reason to suppose the strangles in- 

 herently infectious A number of horses having it together 

 is not a proof of its contagious properties ; any more than 

 some escaping, and others having, it is a proof it has none. 

 The strangles, in many instances produces so little inter- 

 ruption to the health, particularly in mild weather, and at 

 grass, as to inflame, maturate, and heal, without the affair 

 being hardly noticed by the owner. In some cases, how- 

 ever, it reduces young horses to a state of considerable 

 emaciation ; it is said, when very long protracted, to de- 

 generate into glanders ; and the transition from the one to 

 the other does occasionally take place. The exciting causes 

 appear to be those which are productive of catarrh ; thus it 

 is most prevalent in the spring and in damp cold weather. 



Symptoms. — The disease usually commences with the 

 common appearance of mild catarrh, or, as popularly ex- 

 pressed, of slight cold and fever. The horse is somewhat 

 dull, has often cough, some soreness of throat, a slight dis- 

 inclination to food, but still more to water. The under 

 surface of the throat between the jaws swells ; it is hot 

 and tender : sometimes the tumefaction extends to the ear 

 of one or of both sides. On the second or third day it is 

 not unfrequent for the nostrils to throw out a muco- puru- 

 lent discharge ; and if the affection be considerable, the 

 mouth is suffused with a mucous secretion also, or the 

 saliva is slabbered out in great quantities. Now and then 

 the lungs become slightly inflamed, and heaving at the 



