THE HORSE IN SICKNESS AND DISEASE 251 



more rapid than in man. A congestive state of the vessels 

 comes on, and they rapidly give way, by which life is soon 

 destroyed. It is contagions, and few horses seized with it 

 recover ; indeed, its nature is such that most proprietors 

 determine to destroy the infected animal, in order to prevent 

 its spreading. (See Glanders and Influenza.) 



II.— Inflammation. 



Inflammation may be defined as a disorder of the capillary 

 blood-vessels, that being its most visible sj^mptom ; this, 

 however, goes no further than enabling us to recognise its 

 presence by the heat, distension, redness, and pain which 

 are so called. The blood passing through the capillaries 

 gives forth an abnormal amount of caloric, hence the part 

 is hot ; the increased quantity of fluid distends them, hence 

 the swelling ; and from pressure on the nerves the tender- 

 ness ; lastly, to the red globules of the blood, which, in 

 health and its accompanying contractile power, are not 

 admitted to the smaller vessels, but now enter them, the 

 redness is ascribed. Although in the horse, his thick skin 

 and hairy covering prevent the last sign from being so per- 

 ceptible, it is nevertheless always present. The pain is 

 the more acute in proportion as the part is supplied with 

 nervous fibres. 



Inflammation is divided into diffused and local, external 

 and internal. The first class — diffused inflammation — we 

 shall pass over. It is, in fact, general fever, indicated by 

 an excessive irritability, carrying the constitutional disturb- 

 ance of a severe local inflammation to the brain, and thence 

 pervading the system. It therefore comes under considera- 

 tion of diseases of the brain, nervous system, and heart, or 

 circulation. In inflammation of the eye, function is im- 

 paired or suspended, and the sight affected ; in the ear, 

 deafness or preternatural and painful sensibility to sound ; 

 when of the liver, the faeces are clay-coloured, indicating 

 absence of bile ; in the kidneys, inflammation impairs or 

 stops the secretion of the urine ; in the limbs, inflammation 

 prevents motion or induces lameness. It is accompanied by 

 redness and swelling with heat and pain. 



Causes and Various Results of Inflammation. — Inflam- 

 mation may arise from a variety of causes, some obvious, 

 others veiled from our view, and only discoverable by 



