184 VETERINARY SURGICAL THERAPEUTICS. 
lent infection. Putrid intoxication has, moreover, become very rare, 
since the era of antisepsis. The extensive purulent centers, the bur~ 
rows, and the underminings where pus decomposes and putrefies, should 
be frequently cleansed and irrigated with strong disinfecting solu- 
tions. Ifthe matter secreted by the wound is retained on account of 
its disposition, enlargement of the wound and counter-openings should 
be made with the cautery, and perfect drainage secured. 
As soon as the first indications of putrid intoxication are present 
more care must be given to the traumas, disinfecting irrigations must 
be repeated, nebulizations or baths increased, as the region permits. 
If this is large and extended, its superficial layer should be destroyed 
with the red-hot iron; in this way, an obstacle to the absorption of the 
putrid poison will be established. On wounds that suppurate freely, 
one should use absorbing and antiseptic powders : coal, coal-tar, cresyl, 
tannin, alone or mixed with iodoform. There should be administered 
internally, tonics and stimulants (sulphate of quinine, carbolic acid, 
salicylic acid, creolin, alcohol, hay teas). When animals have no 
diarrhoea, according to some veterinarians, it is well to cause one, in 
order to hasten the elimination of the absorbed toxic matters. 
IX. 
TETANUS. 
This toxi-infectious disease, frequent in horses but rare in the other 
animals, is produced by an anacrobiotic bacillus—the dacllus of Nico- 
daier—which penetrates into the organism through a solution of con-~ 
tinuity and gives birth to poisons, whose action upon the nervous 
centers promote tetanic convulsions. 
Up to our time, there were recognized: 3, a aumatic tetanus, having 
a wound for starting-point; 2, a spontaneous tetanus, able to appear in' 
the absence of a trauma. This old conception of the duality of tetanus 
still has advocates in both medicines. Facts are adduced in its favor 
‘to the effect that the disease has made its appearance without being 
preceded by a visible lesion of the tegument which would permit the. 
passage of the tetanigenous agents; but these facts are far from pos-~ 
sessing the value attached tothem. If, indeed, the specific bacillus 
has a marked predilection for deep, anfractuous traumas, with bruised 
borders, ischemic or gangrenous, there are other ways of entrance which 
may remain easily overlooked; such as the superficial wounds of the 
skin, concealed by the hair, so common in regions in contact with the 
harness or on the extremities ; such as the lesions of the velvety tissue, 
which occur in the median lacune of the frog when this is thrushy, or 
at the commissures of the plantar sole, when there is a loose portion of 
the wall; and such as the wounds of all kinds developed on the mucous. 
