DISEASES OF HORSES. 221 



lent. The stools are merely solutions of the aliment, and unmixed 

 with membranous films as in dysentery or molten grease. It some- 

 times succeeds to over strong physic, at others the food enters into 

 new combinations, and forms a purge. Some horses have their 

 bowels constitutionally weak, as lank-sided small carcassed ones, 

 where the mechanical pressure hurries the contents forwards. Salt 

 mashes and sea water will purge horses violently sometimes. It is 

 always proper to encourage warmth in the skin, and to change the 

 food. The change should be generally from one more moist to one 

 less so, as beans, &c. Barley will sometimes stop looseness ; malt 

 usually increases it. Buckwheat is often a check to habitual diar- 

 rhoea. Efficacious astringents will be found in the (Vet. Pha. 131.) 

 Repeat either of these night and morning. Give but little water 

 and that little warm. 



53. Colic, flatulent or spasmodic, called also gripes, fret, or gul* 

 lion, is an important, because a frequent, disease, and because it 

 frequently destroys either quickly by its irritation, or by its de- 

 generating into the red or inflammatory colic, when improperly 

 treated or long continued. It is usually very sudden in its attack. 



54. The causes of colic are not always apparent. It is sometimes 

 occasioned by intestinal stones, which accumulate to a great size, 

 remaining for years in the cells of the colon, until some accidental 

 displacement occasions an interruption to the peristaltic motion. 

 Cold in its various forms is a parent of colic ; but under the form 

 of cold water given when a horse is hot, it is most common. 

 In some horses it is so frequent as to become a constitusional ap- 

 pendage. 



55. The distinguishing marks between colic and inflammation of 

 the bowels are gained, according fap Blaine, by attending to the 

 following circumstances. In gripes the horse has violent fits of 

 pain, but they remit, and he has intervals of ease. The pain in red 

 colic is more uniform and less violent. In gripes the pulse is, in 

 general, natural ; in red colic it is quicker than natural, and com- 

 nronly small. The extremities are not usually cold in gripes ; in 

 red colic they usually are. In gripes, the horse attempts to roll on 

 his back, which in red colic he seldom does. There are no marks 

 of fever with gripes, as red eyelids, inflamed nostrils, &,c.,but in 

 red colic they are always present. When the complaint has con- 

 tinued some hours it is always proper to bleed to prevent its ending 

 in inflammation : bleeding in the mouth is quite useless. Back 

 rake, and throw up clysters of warm water, one after another as 



