794 THEORY OF CATARRH, AND 



Owing to the stoppage of perspiration, the skin 

 is dry, tender to the touch, and no longer carries 

 off two or three pounds of water per day, as in 

 health. The consequence is, that it is retained 

 in the blood, (unless carried off by the vicarious 

 action of the kidneys,) by which its power of 

 uniting with the solids and maintaining the se- 

 cretions is diminished ; so that a portion of the 

 caloric which is usually employed in these vital 

 operations, and then carried off with the various 

 excretions, is retained in the blood, causing a 

 slight increase of temperature, termed catarrhal 

 fever. But as the healthy activity of all the or- 

 gans depends on the. continual transfer of caloric, 

 in combination with arterial blood to the solids, 

 by which their composition and power are con- 

 tinually renewed ; it is evident that whenever 

 secretion and nutrition are diminished, there must 

 be a corresponding reduction of sensorial and 

 muscular power. Hence it is, that the acuteness 

 of the senses and intellectual faculties is more or 

 less impaired, while there is a general feeling of 

 langour, stiffness and aching or soreness of the 

 limbs, if not of the whole body, attended with a 

 furred tongue, impaired appetite, and a feeling of 

 drowsiness. 



Such is the brief, but true history and theory 

 of the most common disease that afflicts the hu- 

 man race and all the higher animals ; for it is the 

 roup in poultry, the distemper among dogs, horses, 

 and other mammalia,- nearly all the complaints 



