Constipation from Intestinal Atony. 325 



unusual effort and straining, and even with groaning, and one or 

 more balls that may be exposed in the act are often drawn back 

 and retained by the inversion of the rectum and closure of the 

 sphincter. It is liable to be complicated by impaired appetite, 

 tympanies, slight recurrent colics, and dryness, scurfiness and un- 

 thriftiness of the skin. Not unfrequently the pressure of the im- 

 pacted colon (pelvic flexure) irritates the bladder causing stretch- 

 ing as if to urinate, and the passage of urine often in small quan- 

 tity. There may be the symptoms of any one of the different 

 nervous affections that lead to impaired peristaltic action, or of 

 the local diseases which tend to obstruction of the bowels. 



In dogs there are violent and painful efforts to defecate, which 

 may be fruitless, or may lead to the expulsion of small masses of 

 dry, earthy looking faeces, smoothly moulded on the surface, 

 coated with mucus, streaked it may be with blood and highly 

 offensive in odor. The anus may be puffy and swollen with muco- 

 purulent secretion from the anal glands, which soils the hair of 

 the hips and tail. If the abdomen is flaccid, manipulation with 

 both hands on opposite sides usually detects a solid mass repre- 

 senting the impacted rectum and colon, and extending from the 

 pelvis forward, often to the sternum. The same mass will be 

 reached by the oiled finger introduced into the rectum. Both 

 methods of exploration are painful and may call forth cries from 

 the patient. The abdomen is usually distended, largely from the 

 impacted faeces, in which case it gives a flat sound on percussion, 

 or from gaseous emanation, in which case it is intense, resilient 

 and resonant. Colicy pains are liable to appear, and vomiting at 

 first of food only, then more or less yellow and bilious, and finally 

 of distinctly feculent matters. For a time appetite may be re- 

 tained , but this is gradually lost . There may supervene diarrhoea, 

 which in favorable cases may lead to expulsion of the impacted 

 mass, but in others it fails to completely dislodge it. The patient 

 is dull and spiritless, inclined to lie curled up in dark corners, 

 and when raised walks slowly and stiffly, with the tail carried 

 straight or slightly to one side. The male urinates like a bitch 

 without lifting the leg. The nose is dry, the tongue furred, the 

 teeth usually covered with tartar, and the breath foetid. There 

 is at first no hyperthermia, but some rise of temperature attends 

 on the advance of the disease, and the auto-poisoning by absorbed 

 products of the putrefaction of retained faeces. 



