DISEASES OF THE LIVER. I79 



White arsenic 5 o-rs. 



Cantharides, finel}^ powdered 6 grs. 



Sulphate of iron, ditto 1 to 2 drs. 



Tartarized antimony 1 dr. 



This powder should be mixed together, and then carefully 

 mingled with a handful of bran, to which it will adhere, which 

 should be then mixed with a feed of corn, and given every 

 evening for the space of a fortnight. A dose of physic may be 

 given after two thirds of the medicine has been administered ; 

 which, as soon as it sets, should be followed by the remainder. 

 Linseed oil is, perhaps, the best purgative in such cases. — Ed.] 



CHAP. XXXVI. 



DISEASES OF THE LIVER. 



This organ is not so often diseased in the horse as in the human 

 body. I have, however, in examining horses after death, seen 

 it diseased in a considerable degree. From the comparative 

 simplicity of its structure, and the absence of a gall-bladder, it 

 is seldom affected with jaundice. The liver itself, however, is 

 sometimes found condensed, thickened, or hardened; but more 

 frequently distended, tender, and easily broken. So tender, 

 or rotten, as it is commonly termed, does it become, that it 

 sometimes bursts, or is ruptured, and the horse dies by an 

 effusion of blood into the cavity of the abdomen. 



[Diseases of the liver are much more frequent in the summer 

 than in the winter, and particularly in very hot weather. At 

 this season, inflammation of the liver has often been connected 

 with the epidemic influenza, which it has rendered far more 

 obstinate and dangerous than is usually the case. 



The causes of these diseases are, in addition to the predis- 

 position of the animal to have the liver affected in preference to 

 other parts, a redundancy of blood in the system, by Avhich too 

 much blood is sent to the liver ; too nutritious feeding ; want of 

 exercise ; over-exertion when the horse is in this unfit state ; and 

 long continuance of an unhealthy state of the excretions, and 

 want of proper phj'sic. 



The diseases of the liver in the horse are, perhaps, more 

 obscure than those of any other part. It is here that we require 

 in a peculiar manner the assistance of the patient to tell us the 

 nature and precise seat of pain, together with other feelino-s 

 and symptoms, for want of knowing which the disease is sur- 

 rounded with obscurity and its tx'eatment with difficulty. Dis- 

 eases of the liver not only exist as primary and independent 



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