APOPLEXY. 139 



ones too, in which the horse beats himself about in a terrible manner ; but 

 there is rarely disposition to do mischief. In the greater number of cases 

 these convulsions last not long. All the powers of life are oppressed, and 

 death speedily closes the scene. 



On examination after death, the whole venous system is usually found in a state 

 of congestion, and the vessels of the brain are peculiarly turgid with black blood 

 Occasionally, however, there is no inflammation of the brain or its membranes ; 

 but either the stomach contains a more than usual quantity of food, or the larger 

 intestines are loaded with foul matter. 



This disease is found more frequently in the stable of the postmaster and the 

 farmer than anywhere else. Thirty years ago it was the very pest of these 

 stables, and the loss sustained by some persons was enormous ; but, as veteri- 

 nary science progressed, the nature and the causes of the disease were better 

 understood, and there is not now one case of staggers where twenty used to 

 occur. 



Apoplexy is a determination of blood to the head, and the cause is the over- 

 condition of the animal and too great fulness of blood. Notions of proper condi- 

 tion in the horse now prevail very different from those by which our forefathers 

 were guided. It no longer consists in the round sleek carcase, fat enough for 

 the butcher, but in fulness and hardness of the muscular fibre, and a compara- 

 tive paucity of cellular and adipose matter— in that which will add to the power 

 of nature, and not oppress and weigh her down. 



The system of exercise is better understood than it used formerly to be. It 

 is proportioned to the quantity and quality of the food, and more particularly 

 the division of labour is more rational. The stage-horse no longer runs his 

 sixteen or eighteen, or even two-and-twenty miles, and then, exhausted, is 

 turned into the stable for the next twenty hours. The food is no longer eaten 

 voraciously ; the comparatively little stomach of the animal is no longer dis- 

 tended, before nature has been able sufficiently to recruit herself to carry on 

 the digestive process ; the vessels of the stomach are no longer oppressed, and the 

 flow of blood through them arrested, and, consequently, more blood directed to 

 other parts, and to the brain among the rest. 



The farmer used to send his horses out early in the morning, and keep them 

 at plough for six or eight hours, and then they were brought home and suffered 

 to overgorge themselves, and many of them were attacked by staggers and died. 

 If the evil did not proceed quite to this extent, the farmer's horse was notori- 

 ously subject to fits of heaviness and sleepiness — he had half-attacks of staggers. 

 From this frequent oppression of the brain — this pressure on the optic nerves as 

 well as other parts, another consequence ensued, unsuspected at the time, but 

 far «too prevalent — the horse became blind. The farmer was notorious for 

 having more blind horses in his stable than any other person, except, perhaps, 

 the postmaster. 



The system of horse management is now essentially changed. Shorter stages, 

 a division of the labour of the day, and a sufficient interval for rest, and for 

 feeding, have, comparatively speaking, banished sleepy staggers from the stables 

 of the postmaster. The division of the morning and afternoon labour of the 

 farmer's horse, with the introduction of that simple but invaluable contrivance, 

 the nose-bag, have rendered this disease comparatively rare in the establishment 

 of the agriculturist. To the late Professor Coleman we are indebted for some 

 of these most important improvements. 



Old horses are more subject to staggers than young ones, for the stomach 

 has become weak by the repetition of the abuses just described. It has not power 

 to digest and expel the food, and thus becomes a source of general, and particu- 

 larly of cerebral, disturbance. 



