6k FISTULA AND POLL-EVIL 
into a still lower state of depression and may 
even die from chronic septicema. Operated on 
in this enfeebled state fatalities are of common 
occurrence. 
The profile of the withers during the course 
of the fistulous stage varies in different cases. 
Some are tumefied on one side, some on both, 
usually from fibrosis but also from common in- 
flammatory swellings which subside with each 
pointing of the abscess. Each aperture leaves 
a tell-tale scar and a denuded zone beneath 
where the discharges have destroved the hair 
follicles. Where caustics, strong blisters or 
strong chemical irrigations have been em- 
ployed this marring is still more pronounced 
(see Fig. 4). 
Where the disease was left to run its own 
course, or was treated by only palliative meas- 
ures, the withers, neck and shoulders are left 
riddled with these indelible blemishes, and 
often through extensive sloughing of the liga- 
mentum nuche the neck drops down in front 
of the withers into a permanent deformity 
(ewe-neck) . 
In other cases the spines at the summit of the 
withers having lost their ligamentous covering 
protrude beneath the imperfectly regenerated 
integument and thereafter become the seat of 
sores from the harness and saddle that are diffi- 
