POISONING 43 



The latter, besides performing this service, are intended to effect the 

 removal of enlargements, especially in connection with the legs. 



Chamois-leather adapted to the leg, and neatly sewn on with stitches 

 known to ladies as " herring-bones ", are often called plasters in racing- 

 stables, but they do not properly belong to that order of applications. 



The medical plasters employed in veterinary practice have a base of 

 pitch, resin, wax, or a mixture of these substances, with which the drugs to 

 be used are incorporated by first melting the former and stirring in the 

 latter until the whole is cool enough to be applied to the skin. Instead of 

 being spread on leather, as is often done in human practice, they are 

 directly applied to the part by means of a spatula or knife, and then tow 

 is cut into lengths of about half an inch and stuck on to the plaster while 

 warm. They may be employed upon any part of the body, but their use 

 is for the most part confined to the limbs, where they are used for the 

 purpose of giving support to sprained and weakened tendons, joints, and 

 ligaments, or to fractured bones. 



25. POISONING 



INTRODUCTION 



A poison is a substance which in small quantities is capable of impair- 

 ing health and destroying life. Animals in the feral state would appear to 

 be largely endowed with an instinct which teaches them to avoid poisonous 

 plants and other deleterious substances. The fox, lynx, and all the mem- 

 bers of the feline tribe are suspicious to a degree in all that concerns their 

 safety, and by the highly-developed sense of smell and taste they readily 

 detect poison when introduced into flesh; though it be the " kill" or carcass 

 they have reserved for a future meal. 



Ages of domestication would appear to have so blunted these senses in 

 horses that they will voluntarily take in their food many medicines which 

 we are accustomed to regard as extremely nauseous. (See Methods of 

 Administration.) It occasionally happens, therefore, that horses are 

 poisoned, either by accident or personal malice, by the consumption of some 

 toxic agent to which they have access in the stable or pasture. 



General Symptoms Of Poisoning. Sudden and serious illness, with 

 symptoms rapidly increasing in severity and without obvious reason, in 

 animals apparently in good health up to the moment of seizure, is incon- 

 sistent with the majority of well-defined diseases, and affords sufficient cause 



