428 SURGICAL DISEASES, 
we increase the riumber of her young ones at each birth, we diminish her 
natural powers of affording. them nutriment, and we give her a degree of 
irritability which renders her whole system liable to he excited and deranged 
by causes that would otherwise be harmless ; therefore it happens that when 
thé petted bitch is permitted to suckle the whole of her litter, her supply: of 
nutriment soon becomes exhausted, and the continued drain upon her produces 
a great degree of irritability. She gets rapidly thin; she staggers, is half- 
unconscious, neglects her puppies, and suddenly falls into a fit of a very peculiar 
character. It begins with, and is sometimes confined to, the respiratory 
apparatus; she lies on her side and pants violently, and the sound of her 
laboured breathing may be heard at a distance of twenty yards. Sometimes 
spasms steal over her limbs; at other times the diaphragm and respiratory 
muscles alone are convulsed. In a few hours she is certainly lost ; or if there 
are moments of remission, they are speedily succeeded by increased heavings. 
“The practitioner unaccustomed to this fearful state of excitation, and for- 
getful or unaware of its cause, proceeds to bleed her, and he seals her fate. 
Although one system is thus convulsively labouring, it is because others.are 
suddenly and perfectly exhausted, and by abstraction of the vital current he 
reduces this last hold of life to the helpless condition of the rest. There is not 
a more common or fatal error than this. - , 
“The veterinary practitioner is unable to apply the tepid bath to his larger 
patients, in order to quiet the erethism of certain parts of the system, and 
produce an equable diffusion of nervous influence. and action; and he often 
forgets it when he has it in his power to save the smaller ones. Let the bitch 
in a fit be put into a bath, temperature 96° of Fahrenheit, and covered with 
the water, her head excepted. It will be surprising to see how soon the simple 
application of this equable temperament will quiet down the erethism of the 
excited system. In ten minutes or a quarter of an hour she may be taken 
out of the bath evidently relieved, and then a hasty and not very accurate 
drying having taken place, she is wrapped in a blanket and placed in some 
warm situation, a good dose of physic having heen previously administered. 
She soon breaks out in a profuse perspiration. Everything becomes gradually 
quiet, and she falls into a deep and long sleep, and at length awakes somewhat 
weak, but to a certain degree restored. : 
“Tf, then, all her puppies except one or two are taken from her, and her food 
is, for a day or two, somewhat restricted, and after that given again of its usual 
quantity and kind, she will live and do well ; but a bleeding at the time of her 
fit, or suffering all her puppies to return to her, will inevitably destroy her. 
“A bitch that was often brought to my house was suckling a litter of puppies. 
She was foolishly taken up and thrown into the Serpentine in the month of 
April. The suppression of milk was immediate and complete. There was 
also a determination to the head and attacks resembling epilepsy. The puppies 
that were suffered to remain with the mother were very soon as epileptic as 
she was, and were destroyed. A seton was inserted ’on each side of her neck. 
Ipecacuanha: was administered, and, that having sufficiently worked, a small 
quantity of diluted sulphuric acid was given. A fortnight afterwards she was 
perfectly well. 
"“ Inversion of the Uterus in a Bull Bitch after Pupping. Extirpation and Cure. 
By M. Cross, M. V., Milan.—‘In July 1829 I was desired to attend a small 
bull bitch six years old, and who had had puppies four times. The uterus 
was completely inverted, and rested all its weight on the vaginal orifice of the 
urethra, preventing the discharge of the urine, and thus being the cause of great 
