JAUNDICE, OR THE YELLOWS. 



other tumors in the liver will effect the same thing. Inflammation 

 may exist in the ducts themselves. They may become thickened or 

 ulcerated, and thus cease to give passage to the bile, which will then 

 be taken up by the absorbents of the liver, or mechanically forced 

 back upon the vessels whence it was secreted. These are occasional 

 causes of jaundice ; and when they exist it will not be wondered 

 at that the complaint is obstinate, and too often fatal. 



Sometimes the source of the evil may exist in the duodenum. It 

 may be inflamed or ulcerated, or thickened, and so the opening from 

 the biliary duct into the intestine may be closed : or the mucus 

 which may be secreted in the duodenum may be too abundant, or 

 of too viscid a character, and thus also the orifice may be mechani- 

 cally obstructed. 



What symptom will indicate to the practitioner which of these 

 morbid states of the liver or its ducts, or if the first intestine, is the 

 cause of the disease ? or if it did, what means could he adopt in 

 such a case with the hope of ultimate success ? The treatment of 

 confirmed jaundice is a thankless and disheartening business. The 

 practitioner, however, must look carefully and anxiously to the symp- 

 toms, and be guided by them. There is no general rule to direct him 

 here. If there is evident fever, he must bleed, and regulate his ab- 

 straction of blood by the apparent degree of fever. In every case 

 but that of diarrhoea, and at the commencement of that, he must 

 administer purgatives — in large doses when fever is present, or in 

 somewhat smaller quantities, but more frequently repeated, when 

 constipation is observed ; and in doses still smaller, but yet sufficient 

 to excite a moderate and yet continued purgative action, when nei- 

 ther fever nor constipation exists. Considering, however, the natural 

 temperament of cattle, the purgative should be accompanied by a 

 more than usual quantity of the aromatic, unless the degree of fever 

 should plainly forbid it. There are few things respecting which 

 veterinary practitioners differ more than the kind of purgative that 

 should be administered in this case. Some, who are usually partial 

 to the Epsom or Glauber's salts, here prefer the aloes. 



It may not, perhaps, be quite a matter of indifference what purga- 

 tive is administered. The Epsom salts here, as in other cases, is the 

 safest, the most to be depended upon, and the most effective : but 

 the secret of treating jaundice, not with the almost invariable suc- 

 cess of which some speak, but with the best prospect of doing good, 

 is by the repetition of mild purgatives, accompanied, and their power 

 increased, and the digestive powers of the animal roused, and his 

 strength supported by the addition of aromatics and stomachics, in 

 such doses as the slight degree, or the absence, of fever ma}- indi- 

 cate. The author certainly cannot confirm by his testimony the 

 opinion of the comparative ease with which the complaint may be 

 removed : he Las not only found it to be one of the most common 



