372 OSSIFICATION OF THE HEAKT. 



was very small and weak, and it was not, with any accuracy, 

 to be counted. She became comatose, with her respiration 

 nearly suppressed, as though she were dead. When she came 

 to, the breathing was shorter and quicker than natural Mr 

 Harrison had her destroyed. The stomach was found in a 

 state of collapse; but her disease was in the heart. ' The 

 left ventricle proved in such a state of dilatation that it 

 almost filled the left cavity of the chest, usually occupied by 

 the lung, but which latter had gradually become absorbed, 

 to accommodate itself to the increased size of the ventricle, 

 and this absorption had proceeded so far that the lung did 

 not exceed the size of the breadth of one's hand, and this 

 remnant was situated at the most posterior and superior 

 part of the chest. The brain was perfectly healthy/ " 



OSSIFICATION OF THE HEAET. 



This singular lesion has been observed several times, and 1 

 am acquainted with two admirable specimens. One is in the 

 London Veterinary College museum, and the other at Alfort. 

 The ossification has evidently extended into the substance of 

 the ventricles, and appears to me to consist in calcification of 

 the areolar tissue, probably associated with fatty degeneration, 

 and removal of a very large portion of the true muscular 

 fibre. It is difficult to understand how the circulation could 

 have been carried on. Mr Percivall says : " Mr Henderson, 

 V.S., London, has in his museum* a remarkably fine speci- 

 men of this disease. The parietes of the right auricle are 

 converted into osseous substance, rendering that cavity but a 

 passive receptacle for the blood: the current must have 

 continued without any, or with hardly any, fresh impulse into 



* Now at the Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons in Red Lion 

 Square. 



