33 



and o£ a liiglily nutritious character, as milk, snttoo, conjee. 

 Calomel and Opium must be administered internally and demulcent 

 enemata may be given with benefit. It must be remembered 

 that dysenteric symptoms are found in an epizootic disorder of 

 elephants resembling Rinderpest of cattle. 



Cases of Intestinal Obstruction have been recorded. Those 

 depend generally on accumulations of woody fibre. It is a stand- 

 ing joke that a V. S. called to treat such a case had to utilize 

 the Jire engine as an enema pump. It is satisfactory that this 

 case was successful, for the story goes on to say that the elephant 

 passed a tree and immediately experienced relief I 



Parasites in the Alimentary Canal op the Elephant. — Tho 

 most interesting resemblance between the disorders of the 

 stomach and bowels of the elephant and the horse is to be found 

 in the fact of each (in India) being frequently invaded by para- 

 sites, especially those known as Bots and Amphistomes. The 

 learned zoologist. Dr. Cobbold, has specially investigated the 

 parasites of the elephant and embodied his results in a paper 

 read before Linnean Society. From this we learn that the inter- 

 nal parasites which may be found are of twelve different kinds, 

 being either Round worms. Flukes, or Bots j the flukes are of 

 the greatest practical importance, as giving rise lo two serious 

 and often fatal disorders. Both in the Horse and Ele2)hant Bound 

 worms are liable to burrow in the coats of the stomach and there 

 form for themselves " abodes " — these occur as tumours occijipied 

 by burrowing channels in the mucous membi-ane lining tte 

 elephant's stomach — it has been found by Dr. Cobbold thalt the 

 larger and smaller of these abodes are formed by different species 

 of worms. No practical importance can yet be attributed to 

 these parasites. One round worm occurs in both stomach and 

 intestines — three other species have been found in the latter 

 organs, they vary in length from 9 lines to 3 inches — and an even 

 larger form is said to occasionally occur in the Bileducts. We 

 have no evidence that these inconvenience the animal in any way. 

 Three species of Flukes — of the kind known as amphistomes, 

 occur in the bowels — only ono of these is of any importance. It 

 has been named Amphistoma Hawkesii by Dr, Cobbold after 

 Colonel Hawkes from whom he received specimens, ^nd who has 

 written on the disorder to which it gives rise (Veterinarian, 1875). 



