HEAVES, OR BBOKEN WIND. 857 



the steamboat { Dewitt Clinton,' owned a valuable trotting mare 

 called Caroline. She had the heaves badly. He took her, in the 

 spring of that year, to Chicago, and turned her out to pasture on 

 the prairie, for the purpose of curing the disease. In the fall he 

 brought her back on his boat, with a quantity of prairie hay to 

 keep her during the winter. During the time she ate the hay, she 

 had no symptoms of heaves. But upon returning again to timothy 

 hay, the heaves returned as bad as before being sent West. (The 

 writer was personally acquainted with Captain Squiers, he being 

 proprietor of the Courter House at that time, where the writer 

 boarded with him.) 



"Prairie hay and grass is more laxative than timothy hay, and 

 the animal cannot eat half as much in a given time of the former 

 as of the latter. Consequently it promotes a condition favorable to 

 respiration, by stimulating the bowels, and also prevents pressure 

 upon the lungs. I think there are several other means of treatment 

 equally as good as prairie grass or hay ; one is corn stalk fodder. 

 My reason is founded on this basis, that it is by saccharine matter 

 that most animals subsist, and the less compass occupied in the 

 bowels the better. One quart of oats is equal to an armful of hay, 

 and three pounds of corn leaves contain more sugar than six times 

 the bulk of timothy hay. It will be seen, then, that the cause, 

 treatment, and cure are marked in these few words ; that is, that 

 heaves are produced by pressure upon the diaphragm by too much 

 food in the stomach and bowels, and is cured by lessening the 

 quantity of food to occupy the same space. Alter the horse is 

 turned out to grass a few days, the heaves will usually disappear, 

 from the fact that the bowels are generally relaxed by exercise and 

 pure air. The only treatment which will prove to any degree 

 effective, is to give one of the following remedies : 



% ounce powdered ginger. 

 ^ ounce capsicum. 



Form into a ball and give three nights in succession; then omit two or three 

 nights, and give again three nights in succession. 



"Or 



8 or 10 drops tincture of phosphorus. 



Give in the drink several times a day for eight or ten days. 



" The horse should have regular exercise, and be watered often 

 with a small quantity at a time, and have straw instead of hay to 

 eat. Under this treatment heaves will disappear/' * 



Prof. Law, in his Veterinary Adviser, says : 



" Overfeeding on clover hay, sainfoin, lucern, and allied plants ; 

 on chaff, cut straw, and other bulky and in nutritious food, is the 

 main cause for heaves. In Arabia, in Spain, and in California, 



* The foregoing is a synopsis of Dr. Somerville's lecture to the writer on 

 "Heaves." 



