THE HORSE IN SICKNESS AND DISEASE 301 



such is the case it is the more dangerous. It is sometimes 

 attended with costiveness — the dung beinc^ often offensive 

 and coated with mucus ; and yet the membrane lining the 

 bowels is so irritable as to be violently acted on if physic is 

 administered. On applying the ear to the chest, instead of 

 the healthy murmur, we generally hear a wheezing or 

 sucking sound ; sometimes one resembling brickbats being 

 rolled down from a considerable height is audible, owing 

 to the air struggling with the mucus ; but this, of course, 

 will depend very much on the quantity of secretion which 

 is effused. The breath is warm, and the mouth usually hot 

 and dry. 



Treat^nent — One of the sequelae of chronic bronchitis is 

 thickening and change of structure in the air-passages, from 

 which decreased capacity follows, with " thick wind " and 

 wheezing. There may be a seeming necessity for bleedings, 

 yet, violent as the symptoms may appear, the patient will 

 not often bear loss of blood. Here, therefore, more than 

 in any other disease, will appear the propriety of the 

 caution elsewhere recommended when treating of the opera- 

 tion of bleeding. No fixed quantity should be abstracted. 

 The operation should never be left to the assistant, but 

 should take place under the practitioner's own eye, in order 

 that the bleeding may be stopped on the very first indica- 

 tion that the system is affected. There is no rule which 

 admits of so few exceptions as this : that a disease of the 

 mucous surfaces (and this is one) requires prompt and 

 decisive treatment, but at the same time very cautious 

 remedies, from the rapid debility which is connected with 

 all these affections. 



Perhaps, after all, it is better bleeding should altogether 

 be abstained from. Such a blood-letting as we dare hazard 

 in bronchitis is not likely materially to affect the disease ; 

 while the smallest abstraction of the vital fluid is sure to 

 tell with dangerous (perhaps fatal) certainty during the 

 subsequent debility. 



Although it will be desirable to relax the bowels, aloes 

 will be dangerous, except in the quantity of one or two 

 drachms, and not repeated ; but it will be better to sub- 

 stitute a pint, or nearly so, of linseed oil, guarded by a 

 drachm of chloroform, and to assist its action by clysters 

 if there is costiveness. 



Sedative medicine, such as the fever-ball, should be given 



