500 MEDICINE. 



safer tonics, and far better and safer caustics. The method of detecting the 

 presence of arsenic in cases of poisoning has been described at page 292. 



Balls. — The usual and the most convenient mode of administering veterinary 

 medicines is in the form of balls, compounded with oil, and not with honey or 

 syrup, on account of their longer keeping soft and more easily dissolving in the 

 stomach. Balls should never weigh more than an ounce and a half, otherwise 

 they will be so large as not to pass without difficulty down the gullet. They should 

 not be more than an inch in diameter and three inches in length. The mode 

 of delivering balls is not difficult to acquire ; but the balling-iron, while it often 

 wounds and permanently injures the bars, occasions the horse to struggle more 

 than he otherwise would against the administration of the medicine. The horse 

 Bhould be backed in the stall ;— the tongue should be drawn gently out with the 

 left hand on the off side of the mouth, and there fixed, not by continuing to 

 pull at it, but by pressing the fingers against the side of the lower jaw. The 

 ball, being now taken between the tips of the fingers of the right hand, is passed 

 rapidly up the mouth, as near to the palate as possible, until it reaches the root 

 of the tongue. It is then delivered with a slight jerk, and the hand being im- 

 mediately withdrawn and the tongue liberated, the ball is forced through the 

 pharynx into the oesophagus. Its passage should be watehed down the left side 

 of the throat ; and if the passage of it is not seen going down, a slight tap or blow 

 under the chin will generally cause the horse to swallow it, or a few gulps ot 

 water will convey it into the stomach. Very few balls should be kept ready, 

 made, for they may become so hard as to be incapable of passing down the gullet, 

 or dissolving in the stomach, and the life of the horse may be endangered or lost. 

 This is peculiarly liable to be the case if the ball is too large, or wrapped in 

 thick paper. 



Bark, Peruvian. — A concentrated preparation of this is entitled the Sul- 

 phate of Quinine. The simple bark is now seldom used. If it has any 

 good effect, it is in diabetes. The quinine, however, is strongly recommended 

 by Professor Morton as singularly efficacious in the prostration of strength which 

 is often the consequence of influenza. 



Basilioon is a valuable digestive ointment, composed of resin, bees'-wax, and 

 olive-oil. If it is needed as a stimulant, a little turpentine, and verdigris may 

 be added. 



Belladonnas Extractum, Extract op Deadly Nightshade. — The inspis- 

 sated juice is principally used as a narcotic and sedative, and indicated where 

 there is undue action of the nervous and vascular systems, as in tetanus, carditis, 

 and nervous affections generally. Externally, it is beneficially applied to 

 the eye. 



Blisters are applications to the skin which separate the cuticle in the form 

 of vesicles containing a serous fluid. They excite increased action in the vessels 

 of the skin, by means of which this fluid is thrown out. The part or neighbour- 

 ing parts are somewhat relieved by the discharge, but more by the inflammation 

 and pain that are produced, and lessen that previously existing in some con- 

 tiguous part. On this principle we account for the decided relief often 

 obtained by blisters in inflammation of the lungs, and their efficacy in abating 

 deeply-seated disease, as that of the tendons, ligaments, or joints ; and also 

 the necessity of previously removing, in these latter cases, the superficial 

 inflammation caused by them, in order that one of a different kind may be 

 excited, and to which the deeply-seated inflammation of the part will be 

 more likely to yield. The blisters used in horse-practice are composed of 

 cantharides or the oil of turpentine, to which some have added a tincture 

 of the croton-nut. 



