244 THE COMMON COLICS OF THE HORSE 



ment of the fibres of the cardiac end of the stomach 

 walls rendering the eructation or belching up of the gas 

 by road of the oesophagus an utter impossibility. It 

 must gain exit from the body by way of the intestines 

 and rectum, or accumulate in the stomach to the extent 

 of causing rupture of that organ and death. Given the 

 gas formation, and we have here a direct danger in the 

 administration of a sedative, a danger entirely dependent 

 on the anatomy of the horse's stomach. We lock the 

 natural outlet, namely, the intestines, and the gases 

 accumulate in the stomach to a degree that is dangerous. 



I may be met with the argument that two of the seda- 

 tives I have mentioned (chloral hydrate and cannabis 

 indica) do not arrest the action of the bowels. To that 

 I have this reply : Those two certainly are not the 

 sedatives in common use among veterinarians. Opium 

 and morphia, and belladonna and atropine, with their 

 dangerous effects, easily run a good first. Putting that 

 on one side, I feel it hard to concieve of a drug which, 

 while diminishing pain and sensibility in any organ, yet 

 fails to influence in some degree or other that organ's 

 movements. Chloral hydrate and cannabis indica may 

 not, to the extent of opium and belladonna, unfavourably 

 affect peristalsis. Yet no one will deny that they come 

 under the same class of drugs, and must, in common 

 parlance, be ' tarred with the same brush.' 



There is another consideration, this time a selfish one, 

 that should concern the veterinarian when contempla- 

 ting the use of a sedative in colic. He should remember 

 that to a very great extent — an extent hardly realized 

 by those who constantly use them — anodynes effectually 

 mask the symptoms of the animal's complaint. In words 

 I once heard, 'There is no real art in relieving pain. 

 Anyone with a few grains of morphia and a hypodermic 



