Infla/mmation and Fever. 1 7 



tlie normal, the excessive destruction of tissue having begun, 

 and the blood driven from the cooler surface, and accumu- 

 lating in the hot interior, at once favors tissue-change and 

 maintains the extra heat thereby produced. In cattle the 

 end of the tail is soft and flaccid from this stage onward. 

 The cold stage lasts a few minutes or one or two days in 

 different cases. 



Hot Stage. The hot stage appears as a reaction from 

 the chill, the contraction in the minute vessels of the skin 

 giving place to dilatation, so that the whole surface, including 

 the extremities, becomes hot and burning, but still dry and 

 parched. The burning is especially noticeable in the more 

 vascular parts, like the roots of the horns and ears, the muz- 

 zle or snout, the mouth, the hoofs, the bare parts of the 

 paws in carnivora, and the mammae (udder) in suckling 

 animals. The mucous membranes lining the nose and mouth 

 become hot and red, the breathing freer, but not less rapid, 

 the pulse softer but accelerated, appetite (and rumination) 

 greatly impaired or lost, thirst great, costiveness increased, 

 urine diminished and of a higher color, the flow of milk 

 greatly impaired or entirely' arrested, and the dullness and 

 prostration greatly increased. 



The hot stage lasts longer than the cold one, usually per. 

 sisting until death or convalescence. It may alternate with 

 chills throughout the whole course of the illness, and in the 

 fever of inflammation the interruption of the Act stage 

 by a chill usually implies either a considerable extension of 

 the inflammation or the occurrence of suppuration. 



Defervescence. The decline of the fever may take place 

 by a sudden reduction of the body temperature to the natu- 

 ral standard, or near it, and a sudden and general improve- 

 ment in the symptoms (crisis), or by a slow improvement 

 from day to day through a more or less tedious convales- 

 cence (lysis). 



Ifatural Temperature. The body temperature of the 



