Dourhie 83 



slight deviations from the normal. One very bad case, an im- 

 ported French draft stallion, showed very great enlargement of 

 the scrotum, which was hard and unyielding to the touch. The 

 skin of the scrotum was enormously thickened and of a pale 

 yellow color. The inguinal glands of the right side were the 

 seat of an extensive abscess, opening at the upper part of the 

 scrotum. A large abscess, occupying the usual position of the 

 testicle, was filled with dark yellow, hard, cheesy pus, which 

 had pushed the gland from its place up into the inguinal canal. 

 The testicle was small, atrophied, soft, flabby and pale yellow in 

 color, witli the serous covering firmly adherent at every part. 

 The surface of the penis offered no evidence of disease. The 

 urethra contained a small amount of a dirty, purulent secretion ; 

 the lining membrane was rough, grayish-yellow in color, with- 

 out any appearance of ulcers. The seminal vesicles and enlarged 

 portions of vasa deferentia contained thin, grayish, purulent 

 accumulations. The left testicle was normal in size, with cover- 

 ings firmly adherent at every part. No appearance of ulcers was 

 found in the urethra or upon the penis of either of the several 

 stallions examined. 



Investigators have observed inconstant changes in the nervous 

 system, principally of injection of the coverings of the brain and 

 spinal cord, softening of the lower part of the cord and occa- 

 sional extravasation of fluid into the ventricles of the brain. 

 Thanhoffer describes extensive degeneration of the nuclei of the 

 nerve cells in the spinal cord. The nasal mucous membrane 

 usually shows catarrhal inflammation. 



Differential Diagnosis. Few contagious diseases of animals 

 have been so confusedly described by veterinary writers. At 

 first there was a very general confusion between Doiirine and 

 Genital Horse Pox, a condition which still continues in many 

 descriptions of the malady. 



According to our observations, the most reliable local S5'mp- 

 toms for the diognosis of Dourine in the stallion consists of the 

 doughy, elastic swelling of the prepuce, with varying degrees of 

 penial paralysis, the penis hanging somewhat out of its sheath, 

 usually retained within the prepuce. The urethral opening is 

 usually inflamed and, from it, a slight discharge escapes, but 

 there is nothing visible to the naked eye to mark this as differing 

 from lesions of these parts due to other causes. 



