364 DISEASES OF BREATHINa. 



which is always hurried in such cases, often attains a rate of over 

 40 respirations in the minute. The constant noise and vibration 

 on board a steamer in movement makes it very difficult, when 

 pleurisy is present, to properly observe the characteristic sounds 

 of that complication, which are similar to those of ordinary 

 pleurisy. The pulse is very frequent ; often over 70 in the minute.-. 

 Although the appetite is more or less in abeyance, the patient 

 will sometimes continue to nibble his hay to the very end, and 

 not unusually dies with some hay between his teeth. As a rule, 

 he drinks very little water, apparently on account of the hurried 

 state of his breathing. The disease generally runs its course in 

 about six days, during the last two or three of which there is a 

 watery discharge from the lungs in varied quantities. Sometimes 

 this discharge merely moistens the opening of the nostrils and 

 the muzzle; but on other occasions the animal often licks it off 

 his muzzle. At first it is colourless, but later on it assumes a 

 rusty red tint, which indicates that putrefaction is present in the 

 lungs. This discharge is accompanied by a foetid smell from the 

 nostrils, which increases in intensity according to the extent of 

 the putrefactive condition of the lungs. Occasionally, the patient 

 dies suddenly, but death as a rule is caused by exhaustion and 

 inability to get a sufficiency of air into the lungs to sustain life. 



RATE OF MORTALITY. — The large majority, probably over 80 

 per cent., of horses which become affected by this disease, die. 



POST-MORTEM APPEARANCES. — Among the ordinary signs 

 of pneumonia and pleurisy, I have always found an unusually large 

 quantity of serum in the pleural cavities. Captain J. M. Christy, 

 M.R.C.Y.S., tells me that he has observed a marbled condition of 

 the lungs, closely resembling that of contagious pleuro-pneumonia 

 in cattle. 



TREATMENT. — The only treatment which I have found at all 

 beneficial, is careful nursing and change of air, for instance, to 

 a deck above the one on which the animal became affected, or 

 from the leaward to the windward side. The only way to be suc- 

 cessful in this attempt, is to begin the treatment at the onset of 

 the disease. If constipation be present, back-raking, an enema and 

 a dose of Epsom salts might be tried. As a stimulant, spirits (a 

 quarter of a pint of whisky in a pint of water) or carbonate of 

 ammonia (2 drachms in a ball) will often be useful. 



Congestion of the Lungs 



is usually caused by over-exertion j by chill after prolonged, hard 



