368 HEALTH AND DISEASE 



necessary to defer completing the operation to a future day, in which 

 case a light diet should be prescribed for a few days, say from three to 

 seven, when the operation may be again renewed, and, if possible, carried 

 to completion. In the meantime portions of stone may enter the perineal 

 orifice and become arrested in it. These are to be carefully removed, and 

 it may be necessary also to pass the catheter to discharge any debris 

 which may have accumulated in the urethral canal. In addition to this 

 the bladder will require to be thoroughly washed out once daily with 



Fig. 160. Scoop 



warm carbolized water for the first two or three days, after which it 

 may be discontinued. 



On completion of the operation the bladder should be carefully searched 

 with the short metallic sound (fig. 161), and if found free from fragments 

 of stone it only remains to remove the animal to his box. He should then 

 be dealt with according to the rules laid down for the after-treatment of 

 lithotomy. An opiate draught, followed by warm fomentations to the 

 perineum with carbolized water and periodical injections of warm water 

 into the rectum, will serve to soothe the injured parts and allay irritation. 



Fig. 161. Sound 



Vesical Calculus in the Mare. Mares are seldom the subjects of 

 vesical calculus. This immunity may be referred in part to the short and 

 straight outward course of the urethra, which favours the free extrusion of 

 solid matter with the urinary discharges. 



Occasionally, however, stone is found in the female organ, but not so 

 frequently as is generally stated. Several instances have been brought to 

 the notice of the writer where intestinal calculi ejected from the rectum 

 have been said to have escaped from the bladder in the act of urination. 

 The form, character, and composition of these concietions, however, were 

 in each case sufficiently marked to enable him to decide to the contrary. 

 The symptoms of the affection are, for the most part, the same as those 

 described in the horse. 



Eemoval of vesical calculus in the mare is usually a much more simple 

 and less dangerous matter than in the horse. 



When the stone is small the operation may in some cases be performed 

 standing. Having made the animal secure with twitch and side-line, the 



