28 VETEEINARY TOXICOLOGY 



potassium iodide is held to facilitate the elimination of 

 lead and of mercury. 



The best advice to owners is to do as little as possible, 

 keep the patient quiet, summon professional assistance at 

 once, and inform the veterinarian of all the circumstances 

 and the measures already taken. 



For cattle, one and a half times the dose advocated for the 

 horse is to be used. 



POST-MORTEM. 



The post-mortem of a suspected poison case should be 

 made with extreme care, particularly in view of possible 

 legal action. Pull notes of all circumstances relating to 

 the surroundings of the subject, feeding, accessibility to 

 sources of poisoning, or of persons likely to have malicious 

 intent, and of the symptoms, should be made, verified, and 

 preserved. Careful search may reveal recognisable or 

 suspicious traces of poison, or of a poisonous plant. Any 

 such material should be preserved and verified by ex parte 

 evidence, which, whilst satisfactory in all cases, is almost 

 essential in litigious cases. 



The lesions are rarely — perhaps never — very character- 

 istic, and the most common observation is of more or less 

 acute gastro-enteritis. Such pathological changes as yellow 

 atrophy of the liver in phosphorus and arsenic poisoning 

 may be absent in very acute cases. In general pure alkaloid 

 or other vegetable poisons do not produce irritation, but 

 most mineral poisons and plants do so. 



Search of the alimentary contents often discloses the 

 cause. Hydrocyanic acid imparts its faint smell to all parts 

 of a poisoned subject ; similarly carbolic acid, chloroform, 

 alcohol, and essential oils may be found. Phosphorus 

 betrays its presence by its garlic odour and luminescence, 

 but only when free, and it is hardly ever thus encountered 

 in the dog. 



Certain poisons impart colour ; thus, copper salts give a 

 greenish-blue, chromic compounds a yellow to orange or 



