126 



MODERN HORSE MANAGEMENT 



[chap. 



septic before use, and rinsed with cold water after 

 use. They should be kept greased, otherwise 

 they will become stiff, and are liable to break 

 in two when inside and perhaps cause serious 

 trouble. They must never be inserted unless 

 they are absolutely flexible. A wire should be 

 used to keep the inside free of foreign matter 

 before use. They must never be allowed to 

 become frozen. 



503. Poultices.— Every poultice that is put on 

 must be antiseptic. One pound of linseed should 

 be taken, and enough boiling water added to 

 make a mash ; suflBcient carbolic or creolin must 

 be added to the water to make a 3 per cent, 

 solution. The poultice must be well mixed with 

 a stick. In modern medicine, poultices are 

 seldom used ; their chief use is to bring an 

 abscess to a head and to draw a poison out of a 

 prick in the feet, or to soften the feet. A poultice 

 made without an antiseptic is a dangerous thing 

 to put on an open wound, because it acts as an 

 incubator to the germs of disease, thus probably 

 causing more harm than good. 



A poultice must never be left on over night ; 

 if, therefore, the horse is not attended to for any 

 length of time, as during the night, hot cotton- 

 wool should be used in the place of a poultice. 

 This remains hot for a longer period, and never 

 gets cold and damp as a poultice does. A cold, 

 damp poultice, for this reason, often counteracts 

 the good that the hot poultice has done. The hot 

 wool should be put on so that the hand can just 

 be borne against it, and plenty of flannel band- 

 ages placed outside to keep in the heat. Pillow 

 feathers make the best insulator against the con- 

 duction of heat. 



504. Mvstard. — This must be mixed with cold 

 water only, and on no account must it be mixed 

 with warm water or vinegar, as they destroy 

 more than half the life of the mustard. To dilute 

 the action, flour should be added. Mustard 

 should be mixed with the fingers or a spoon in 

 a large basin until it is of a fairly thick con- 

 sistency. This is plastered on the part with a 

 spatula or blunt knife fairly thickly. The time 

 that it remains on depends entirely upon the 

 thickness of the skin and the disposition of the 

 animal. In some cases half an hour will cause 

 sufficient irritation to render it advisable to re- 

 move the mustard ; in others it may be left on 

 until its action ceases — say, twelve to twenty-four 

 hours — when it may be necessary to repeat the 

 plaster. In pneumonia and pleurisy, as a rule, 

 mustard is put on all over the area of the lungs. 

 Ordinary newspaper should be put on outside 

 the mustard, and a blanket over the paper. As 

 a rule, mustard should not be rubbed in. 



505. Condensed Pharmacoposia. — Realising 

 fully that a veterinary surgeon can treat all the 

 cases he has in a year's practice with drugs from 

 a few dozen bottles, in the pharmacopoeia which 

 follows, I have listed the drugs that are most 



necessary in treating diseases of the horse. Many 

 are not listed for obvious reasons ; then, again, 

 there are many which some practitioners would 

 not use themselves ; but, as one drug is often 

 handy whilst another is not, it is advisable to 

 give doses and uses of them. One practitioner 

 prefers one drug and another prefers something 

 different. Changing about from one drug to 

 another is not good therapeutics, except in those 

 difficult cases in which one drug having proved 

 of no avail, another must be tried. 



It is neither possible nor wise to lay down any 

 hard and fast rule for the treatment of diseases, 

 as each practitioner has his own method, guided 

 by broad rules and a sound knowledge of the 

 action of drugs. 



506. Dosage. — Approximately, if a dose for a 

 man is 1, that for a horse, of, say, 15.2 hands 

 in height, is 60. 



Doses for young horses : 



For 3 years and up . .1 



IJ to 3 years , . . h 



9 months to IJ years . J 



4 4 to 9 months . . J 



1 to 4^ months . . iV 



2 to 4 weeks . . . ^ 



Birth to 2 weeks . . pV or that of a man. 



These doses, of course, must vary according to 

 the size and condition of the patient. 



At first all drugs must be given in small 

 doses until the horse is used to the drug ; then 

 they can be enlarged. A thoroughbred or 

 standard-bred horse of high quality requires a 

 smaller dose, as his nerves are better developed. 

 Farm horses take much larger does, even if they 

 are small animals. 



All fluid measures are imperial. (See Sec. 517.) 



A tablespoonful is approximately \ oz. water. 



A teaspoonful is approximately 1 dr. [See 

 Sec. 520.) 



Solutions. — The strength of a solution is 

 generally stated as a percentage, e.g. 5 per cent, 

 sol. carbolic acid in water equals 5 units by 

 weight of carbolic in every hundred units by 

 weight of the solution. 



507. Pharmacopoeia. 



The action, doses, names and formula of 

 drugs : 



