STOMACH-STAGGERS. 103 



and to send yet more blood to that organ which already had a great deal too 

 much. 



STOMACH-STAGGERS. 



A disease not much unlike this is known under the name of Staggers. 

 There are two varieties of it— the sleepy or stomach-staggers, and the mad- 

 staggers ; frequently, however, they are only different stages of the same dis- 

 ease, or varying with the cause that produced them. In Stomach-Staggers 

 the horse stands dull, sleepy, staggering ; when roused he looks vacantly 

 around him; perhaps seizes a lock of hay, and dozes again with it in his 

 mouth ; at length he drops, and dies : or the sleepiness passes off, and deli- 

 rium comes on, when he falls, rises again, drops, beats himself about, and 

 dies in convulsions. The cause of this is sufficiently evident ; and the disease 

 never occurs, except by the fault of those who have the management of 

 the horse. It arises from over feeding. The horse has been permitted to 

 get at a too great quantity of food, or food of an improper nature. When 

 he has been kept for some hours without eating, and has been worked 

 hard, and has become thoroughly hungry, he falls ravenously upon every 

 kind of food he can get at; swallowing it faster than his small stomach 

 can digest it ; and no water being given to soften it, and to hasten its pas- 

 sage, the stomach becomes crammed, and having been previously ex- 

 hausted by long fasting, is unable to contract upon its contents. Tlie food 

 soon begins to ferment and to swell, causing great distension ; the brain 

 sympathizes with this overloaded organ, and staggers are produced. We 

 can easily imagine this, when we remember the sad headaches occasionally 

 arising from an overfilled or disordertd stomach. Sometimes the stomach 

 is ruptured. 



We have little to say of the treatment of the disease so far as medicine is 

 concerned, except that as it is almost or quite impossible for the person 

 most accustomed to horses to distinguish between the early stage of sto- 

 mach and mad staggers (distension of the stomach, and inflammation of 

 the brain), we shoufd be most dihgent and minute in our inquiry into the 

 history of the horse for the preceding twenty-four hours — whether he could 

 have got at an undue quantity of food, or had been worked hard and kept 

 long fasting. Some say that there is a yellowness of the eye, and twitch- 

 ings about the breast in the early stage of sleepy or stomach-staggers. We 

 have seen a great many cases of stom.ach-staggers without this yellowness, 

 or these catchings, and we believe that no one can certainly distinguish 

 between the two, and that we must be guided entirely by the history of 

 the case. 



Bleed very largely ; — that cannot do harm, and in mad staggers is indis- 

 pensable. Give a good dose of physic— that also cannot do harm, although 

 in stomach-staggers it cannot do much good, for it can scarcely find its way 

 into the over-distended stomach, and it certainly cannot find its way 

 through it. Keeping the horse from all food will be a very proper proceed- 



ing, whichever be the disease. 



Some good judges have affirmed that a horse was never cured of stomach- 

 staggers. It was formerly a very difficult thing, but the stomach-jnimp 

 has done wonders in cases of poisoning in the human being, and, by means 

 of a larger and somewhat altered pump, (which every veterinary surgeon, 

 and, we think, every large proprietor of horses, should have on his pre- 

 mises,) this enormous mass of food may, without difficulty, be washed out. 



If, however, we can say but little of the treatment of stomach-staggers, 

 we have much to say of its prevention. It attacks old horses oftener than 



