24 INTRODUCTION. 



By nnrilhor sli^lit convulsivp rtfort nf the nninial the pellet is mnde 

 to break thiouirli the floor of the canal, and is carried to the hase of 

 the gullet, where it is embraced by tlie spiral muscles of that tube, 

 and returned to the mouth ; or it may be more correctly said that the 

 same ellort wiiich sends the prepared pellet from the second stomach 

 into the gullet, to be re-chevved, forces a fresh portion from the paunch 

 into the second stomach. The animal now ruminates at his leisure, 

 and the pellet having been perfectly broken dow^n by the grinding 

 action of the teeth, and softened by an additional secretion from the 

 glands of the mouth, is almost a scn)i-lluid mass; and, when it is 

 again sw^allowed, it either has not sufficient solidity to force itse.f 

 through the floor of the canal, or the beast does not choose that it 

 shall, and it passes on, over the roof of the paunch and the honey- 

 comb, and enters into the third stomach or manyplies. 



A very important hint here suggests itself with regard to medicines, 

 and which has not been sufficiently attended to by the cow-leech or 

 the veterinary surgeon. We may, to a very great extent, send medi- 

 cine into what stomach we please. We may give it in a ball, and it 

 will fall into the paunch, and thence go the round of all the stomachs ; 

 or it may be exhibited in a fluid form, and gently poured down, and 

 the greater part of it passed at once into the third and fourth stomachs. 

 That which is meant to have a speedy action on the constitution oi 

 the disease should be given in a fluid form. That also which is par- 

 ticularly disagreeable should be thus given, otherwise it will enter 

 the paunch, and be returned again in the process of rumination, and 

 disgust the animal, and, perhaps, cause rumination to cease at once. 

 This wou'd always be a dangerous thing, for the food retained in the 

 paunch would soon begin to ferment, and become a new source of 

 irritation and disease.* 



The third stomach, called the manyplus or manyplies, or many- 

 leaves, is, I ♦. its base, a continuation of the canal already referred to, 

 and through uhich fluid food would pass at once into the fourth sto- 

 mach ; but there are suspended from its roof numerous curious leaves, 

 floating loose in the canal, furnished at the edges with numerous little 

 hooks, which intercept and take up everything that may have escaped 

 the action of the teeth, and continues to retain a solid form. The 

 general surface of these leaves is studded with little hard prominences 

 on either si(*e, and, these rubbing against each other, the hardest food 

 is gradually reduced to a fit state for digestion. This being accomplish- 

 ed, the food arrives at last at the fourth or true dio-estive stomach — a 

 long pouct or bag, more abundantly supplied than any of the others 



* Ti has, fowpver, bppn ascertained by exporiment, that if a quantity of liquid, 

 Buch as liriPced tea, he f^jven to a beast just bufore it is slaughtered, tlie greater por- 

 tion will be Oound it) the rumen. The fluids, however, do not require to be ruminated, 

 and tlierefote tho.v ares(]ueezed out by the action of the second stomach, and thus 

 pass onwrtfds to ttie Ihird and fourth stomachs, whilst the solid food is returned to 

 liie mouth and re inasiicated. E%eu after this all the rumioated food does not ne« 

 -essarily pans into the third stomach, but the harder portion again enters the rumen 



lie' i.i a-'ain 'uuiixj.u.ed. 



