General Warnings, 101 



exhaustion; and it is very obvious that this danger is 

 vastly increased by increasing the weakness. 



3. Use blisters y mustard j turpentine and other powerful counter 

 irritants very modei^ately. 



In the horse, the application of any of these causes very 

 great disturbance and distress, high excitement, an increase 

 of fever, and often thus they do far more general harm than 

 local good. Warm fomentations, poultices, etc., are gener- 

 ally much better. 



4. Be especially careful how you bleed. 



Some of the best English veterinarians say, never bleed in 

 this class of diseases. But in the United States, leading 

 authorities concede that in the very early stages of inflam- 

 mation of the lungs, when the animal is young and strong, 

 when the fever is high and the pulse firm, full and hard, 

 three or four quarts of blood promptly taken from the 

 jugular vein will cut short the disease. But it is very rare 

 that we find all these conditions united, and when we have 

 such potent means for lowering the pulse as aconite, veratrum 

 viride and lobelia, we need rarely draw our lancets in these 

 cases. 

 6. Never give medicine by drenches in throat disease or where 



there is much coughing. 



Not only does a neglect of this rule often greatly aggra- 

 vate the disease, by exciting and half strangling the animal, 

 but it frequently disturbs the bowels and thus leads to 

 serious complications. 



It will be seen that most of the above rules completely 

 reverse those laid down by the old farriers, and even those 

 advocated by such comparatively recent writers, as Youatt, 

 Martin, Stonehenge, May hew. Slater, etc. ; but they are those 

 now accepted and taught by the most eminent veterinarians in 

 England and America. 



