682 PATHOLOGY OF PARTURITION. . 



instead of diminishing, appears to increase, owing to the progressive 

 organisation of the inflammatory products, and from the teat there 

 can only be obtained a small quantity of yellowish turbid serum, with 

 perhaps a few coagula of casein, epithelium casts, and sometimes even 

 veritable diphtheritic false membranes. In such a case, all the parts 

 of the gland so altered are irrevocably destroyed, so far as the lacteal 

 secretion is concerned. 



It is from this indurated condition that those degenerations and 

 neoplasms arise which are met with in the mammse of animals, but 

 especially the Bitch. These are the adenomatous, sarcomatous, carci- 

 nomatous, enchondromatous, and fibromatous growths which have 

 been described so often as found in the mammae of this animal, but a 

 consideration of which cannot be entered upon here. 



Supintration — by which is meant the formation of abscess — is a 

 rather frequent termination of mammitis, and particularly of the 

 phlegmonous form. The abscesses may be single or multiple, and vary 

 in size as well as situation. Sometimes they appear immediately be- 

 neath the skin, and between it and the tunic of yellow fibrous tissue 

 covering the gland ; in other cases they are formed in the interstitial 

 connective tissue separating the glands, or even in the interlobular 

 tissue ; while, though rarely, they may be found in the connective 

 tissue between the mammae and the abdominal wall 



Suppuration generally sets in from the eighth to the twelfth day, and 

 is marked by an increase, instead of a diminution, in the symptoms — 

 augmentation of the fever, swelling, and pain. If the abscess in pro- 

 cess of formation is superficial, the pain and redness appear to be 

 greatest at a certain point ; there the skin is at first of a bright red, 

 but changes to a violet hue, and at the same time this part becomes 

 more prominent and circumscribed. Soon there is fluctuation and 

 the other indication of abscess, and if not artificially opened this 

 takes place spontaneously, and the contained pus escapes. Then the 

 febrile symptoms diminish, and the general condition improves ; the 

 swelling in the gland subsides, along with the pain ; pus escapes 

 from the opening for two or three weeks, and finally ceases, the 

 wound becoming cicatrised. Recovery is now complete, and nothing 

 remains save perhaps a small mass of indurated gland where the 

 abscess has been. This subcutaneous or superficial abscess is not 

 generally very injurious or serious. 



It is not so, however, when the abscess is developed in the inter- 

 glandular connective tissue, or in that between the mammae and the 

 abdomen. Here the pus is deep-seated, and it burrows or spreads 

 wherever the resistance is least ; in this way it leads to the forma- 

 tion of sinuses, sloughing of the skin over a wide surface, isolates 

 masses of the glands — thus destroying their relations with neighbour- 

 ing parts, and causing their mortification and total destruction. This 

 mammary suppuration is always serious, as under the most favourable 

 circumstances it generally ends in the animal losing a large portion 

 of the gland ; while in some cases it may cause death from the 

 violence of the inflammation and intensity of the pain, or through 

 exhaustion from the long-continued aud profuse suppuration. 



When the abscess is situated in the interstitial or lobular connective 

 tissue, the case is no better, but perhaps worse. Owing to the nature 

 and disposition of the tissues, which resist distention, the pain pro- 

 duced by the inflammation is most acute and distracting; while the 



