204 THE COMMON COLICS OF THE HORSE 



is heated. It is conceivable that either of these factors 

 would tend to lower the body vitality, and that any pre- 

 disposition there may have been would be hurried into 

 an attack by their aid, such predisposition being the 

 presence of the necessary virus in the intestinal tract, 

 and some condition of the bowel wall (irritation from 

 calculi, impaction, etc.) favouring the entrance of the 

 germ. 



At any rate, whatever may be the real explanation, it 

 is simply madness for anyone to imagine that any such 

 trivial cause as cold, over-fatigue, etc., is sufficient per se 

 to bring on an attack. As Williams rightly enough puts 

 it, ' It is very true that impaction, constipation, intussus- 

 ception, volvulus, the presence of calculi, or the action of 

 irritant poisons, may cause great congestion and inflam- 

 mation of the intestinal membranes ; but the disease to 

 be described originates sui generis, and very often without 

 the occurrence of an immediate and recognisable cause 

 of direct irritation.' 



Although in practice we are somewhat inclined to 

 hold out to our clients the possibility of a case of ' colic ' 

 terminating in enteritis, I should imagine that it is simply 

 a case of ' digging a large enough hole to clamber out of ' 

 should the animal unfortunately die. I do not think that 

 any one of us honestly believes it likely to happen in any 

 great number of cases. We are far more likely to 

 inwardly admit that the case we have misdiagnosed as 

 ' simple colic ' is, in reality, one of twist, intussuscep- 

 tion, etc. 



That being so, and taking WiUiams' statement, ' that 

 the disease originates sui generis,' to mean that there is 

 some specific cause, then there is no other solution that 

 fairly satisfies the problem save the one I have suggested 

 — that of bacterial infection. 



