Preventive and Curative Treatment. 129 



in their power to carry out the measures essential to this 

 end. They may be enumerated as follows : (a) Exclusion 

 of unsound horses for breeding purposes ; (6) Care in the 

 management of young horses ; (c) Hygienic management. 



(a) Exclusion of Unsound Horses for Breeding Purposes. 



Numerous and incontestable facts pointing to hereditary 

 predisposition as a potent factor in the genesis of Roaring, 

 it becomes imperative, in order to diminish its frequency, 

 to exclude from breeding, be they males or females, horses 

 which are already suffering from the defect. This is a 

 severe measure, knowing the high value of some horses, due 

 to their excellent qualities; but its urgent necessitj^ is 

 obvious. Of course, this measure applies more especially to 

 animals in whose ancestors Roaring has been noted for two, 

 three, or more generations, and in which it has become 

 evident without any, or apparently a very slight, assignable 

 cause — especially at an early age. For it must be remem- 

 bered that the defect may arise from a number of what may 

 be termed " remote causes " — such as pleurisy, pneumonia, 

 pericarditis, congestion of the lungs or pleura, strangles, 

 etc. — without hereditary predisposition being present. 

 Whether such predisposition exists in a horse, we have no 

 means of ascertaining, except by instituting inquiries into 

 his pedigree ; for this tendency, in all probability, consists in 

 transmitted anatomical peculiarities, which form the causa 

 interna, and therefore undiscoverable agencies, in the origin 

 of Roaring. 



(b) Care in the Management of Young Horses. 



I have already alluded to the abnormal precocity which 

 is forced upon very young thoroughbred horses, as a likely 

 cause in predisposing them to Roaring ; and I think this 

 has been too much lost sight of, in accounting for the greater 

 and increasing prevalence of the defect among them. For 



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