112 VETERINARY SURGICAL THERAPEUTICS. 
bandage at the digital region. In cases of very severe inflammation of 
the skin and sub-cutaneous tissues, one should endeavor to keep up a 
sufficient circulation, and the changes necessary for the physiological 
functions of the cellular elements; and should also provide against deep 
disorders and alterations incompatible with the presence of life, by 
actively overcoming the phlegmasic phenomena, and above all by using 
-the means which antisepsis gives us. Deep scarifications, division of 
‘the aponeuroses pressing upon the tumefied structures, often produce 
remarkable results. In cases of violent contusions or of wounds from 
-extensive bruising, having a wide ischemic zone, damp compresses or 
warm antiseptic baths are to be recommended: the innervation will 
‘then return, the collateral circulation will become more active, the 
anatomical elements, for a moment in danger, will by degrees recover 
-their original activity ; for the wounds of contusion, the extensive morti- 
fication threatened will be reduced to its minimum, carrying only a few 
mortified shreds from the edges of the traumatism. How to prevent 
several gangrenes of toxic origin, especially that due to ergotism, has 
been known since the day when facts established the intimate connec- 
‘tion existing between the ingestion of food altered by toxic products and 
the appearance of gangrenous disorders in animals which ate this food. 
The only way is to stop its use immediately, change for some other food, 
-or make the stock pasture somewhere else. But economical reasons, 
‘which dominate all questions relating to the keeping and preservation of 
~stock, would often have rendered the execution of these prophylactic 
measures very difficult if gangrene by ergot had not become so rare in 
‘most of the countries of Europe. As far as necrotic accidents are 
concerned which may result from central or peripheral nervous centres, 
-—-diabetes, thrombosis and embolism,—there is no efficacious prophy- 
laxy against these. 
Properly speaking, there is no curative treatment of gangrene. One 
-cannot, indeed, expect to return life to necrosed tissues. Several rules 
ought to be observed, however, to hasten the slough of the dead parts 
and assist the work of repair. 
To limit the extension of the gangrene, assist the elimination of the 
-eschars, and hasten the cicatrization of the wounds remaining; such 
are the principal rules of interference. 
When death has taken place more or less extensively in the tissues, 
‘the most important thing, if one wishes to confine the destruction, is to 
arrest at once the action of the causes which have produced it. Gan- 
“grene of a cutaneous spot, brought on by compression, is prevented 
from spreading, both in width and in depth, by putting a limit to the 
‘compression. By an energetic interference in the case of gangrene from 
severe phlegmasia one may avoid the formation of new sloughs within 
