224 



DISEASES OF HORSES. 



be not however arrested, the termination will be .equally fatal. 

 About the third day the whites of the eyes turn yellow and the 

 mouth also. Bleeding, blistering, and purgatives form the method 

 of cure as practised in red colic. 



59. Chronic inflammation or yellows. The liver of horses is less 

 complex than that of any other animals, and is therefore not very 

 liable to disease ; indeed some authors affirm that the horse is never 

 affected with jaundice, but that the yellowness of skin is a mere 

 stomach affection : this is, however, erroneous, and not only does 

 the liver become hardened and thickened occasionally, but the bile 

 becomes diseased, and is thrown out in that state by the blood over 

 the body. If fever be present, bleed, but if the symptoms present 

 no token of active inflammation, give each night, ten grains of 

 calomel, and every ten days, work it off with a mild dose of physic. 

 It is, however, necessary to remark ; tbat it is not every yellowness 

 of the skin that betokens either an acute or chronic inflammation of 

 the liver. It is the property of every serious inflammation of any 

 of the important organs of the chest and belly, to communicate a 

 portion of the evil to the otbcr organs immediately in conjunction 

 with the liver : thus an affection of the stomach or intestines, of the 

 inflammatory kind, very often occasions redness of the membranes 

 of the nose, eyelids, &c. &c. 



60. Diseases of the urinary organs. Inflammation of the kidneys, 

 is an idiopathic affection, not one of frequent occurrence ; but as 

 brought on by injuries, such as over-riding, heavy loads, or violent 

 diuretics, it is not imfrequent : when idiopathic, it may be the effect 

 either of cold, heating food, or a translation of same other inflam- 

 mation, in which cases it comes on suddenly, and assumes the same 

 febrile appearances that other intestine inflammations produce ; but 

 there is not often great apparent pain, but a frequent inclination to 

 stale, the quantity made being so small as almost to amount to a 

 stoppage of urine, which is less or more complete as one or both 

 kidneys are affected. What little urine is made, is also at first verv 

 thick, and then bloody. When the disease is the effect of external 

 injury, the urine is not so scanty, but is more bloody; arid this 

 symptom precedes the other. There is usually much pain and 

 stiffness about the loins, and we learn from Elaine, that a swelling 

 and a paralytic affection of the hind leg of the side of the affected 

 kidney, sometime? is a feature in the complaint. To distinguish 

 this inflammation from that of the neck or body of the bladder, 

 with which it may be confounded, the same author recommends 

 that the hand be passed up the rectum, when if the affection belong 



