Foreign Bodies in the Rumen and Reticulum. 119 



especially in the case of cutting or sharp pointed bodies, which 

 beside wounding the walls of the rumen, show a marked tendency 

 to advance to the heart and penetrate it, or to perforate the liver, 

 diaphragm or abdominal walls and even to cause a fistula through 

 which the ingesta escapes. 



Causes. The common cause in cattle is the habit of swal- 

 lowing, after one or two strokes of the teeth, any small object 

 that is mixed with the provender. Next to this comes the habit 

 of stabled cows, and of such as suffer from a lack of phosphates 

 or other important element in the food, of licking, chewing, and 

 swallowing articles that can in no sense be considered as ali- 

 mentary. 



Among the rounded or smooth bodies found in the rumen and 

 reticulum may be named coins, rivets, fragments of wood, cords, 

 pieces of rope, leather, gloves, cloth, small garments like vests or 

 caps, ribbons, bones, pieces of lead, dried paints, cotton waste 

 used as packing for machinery, shot, and even small animals 

 such as frogs, toads, and snakes ; also sand and pebbles. 



Among sharp or pointed bodies the most common are nails, 

 pins, needles, baling wire, pieces of iron or other metals, knives, 

 scissors, forks, fragments of glass', thorns, etc. 



Lesions. These are as varied as the nature of the traumatic 

 agent, the seat and nature of the trauma. The rounded bodies, 

 if nonpoisonous, act merely by attrition of the walls and tend to 

 induce a local catarrhal inflammation. Yet even sharp pointed 

 bodies may prove comparatively harmless. The museum of the 

 N. Y. S. V. College contains a pocket knife which had remained 

 open in the rumen for a length of time without producing any 

 visible injury. 



Sharp and pointed bodies are especially liable to be entangled 

 in the cells of the reticulum ; so that this viscus is the most 

 common seat of the resulting trauma. Around this there occur 

 hyperemia, exudation, thickening and centrally ulceration, 

 which may lead into a fistula or abscess, confined it may be to 

 the wall of the viscus, or continued into the surrounding organs. 

 In this way may be implicated, the liver, the spleen, the dia- 

 phragm, the abdominal or thoracic walls, the lung, the peri- 

 cardium or the heart. The pus is always foetid and usually 

 mixed with alimentary matter. If it approaches the surface it 



