228 VETERINARY SURGICAL THERAPEUTICS. 
thermic irritations. Solar erythema, frequent in tropic regions, assumes 
this latter form. 
In horses, swine, and especially sheep, under the double influence of 
feeding with buckwheat and exposure to the sun, a diffuse erythema 
may develop, often complicated with bullate, phlegmonous or gangrenous 
dermatitis. Uponcattle and sheep fed on buckwheat, and having vesicular 
cutaneous eruptions, Wedding observed that the lesions were so much 
the more marked as the subjects had less pigment, were whiter, or were 
exposed to direct solar or diffused light. Animals that were kept in the 
dark did not have any eruption. Piebald-colored animals were not affected, 
except on the white parts of their tegument. A cow covered with tar 
on one side of the body took exanthema only on the other side.? 
The treatment, above all, must be prophylactic; it has various regula- 
tions. Clean the skin, prevent its mechanical irritation, guard the animals 
against a too hot sun, keep them under trees or in places where they 
are not exposed to reflections of the light, protect the head with a hood, 
cover the parts with vaseline, or use the decoction of henna (Lawsonia : 
inermis), with which Arabs dye the white regions of the body of their horses 
and protect them from solar erythema.” 
When erythema is due to feeding on buckwheat, this must be changed, 
the animals kept out of the sun, and taken out only in the evening or 
in cloudy weather. The disease has a natural tendency towards resolu- 
tion. This will be promoted by astringent lotions (acetate of lead, tannin, 
sulphate of iron) or by coldirrigations. Applications of glycerine, vaseline 
with boric acid, lead and zinc salts are used. Often it will be sufficient to 
dust the erythematous surface with starch. If the itching is severe, cocained 
vaseline or nitrate of silver solution, 5 per cent., can be used. 
Extensive cedemas, subcutaneous phlegmons and cutaneous gangrene 
are possible complications. Severe erythematous inflammation of the skin 
demands the use of antiphlogistics (irrigations, cold compresses), or of 
disinfecting solutions, when the phlegmasia is suppurative or gangrenous. 
The erythema which occurs in horses, on the axilla or the groin, under 
the influence of work when the skin is covered with perspiration and dust 
—intertrigo—gives way rapidly to the simplest treatment: rest, washing 
the parts with tepid water, dusting them with starch or starch and sub- 
nitrate of bismuth. When the exudation has disappeared, the dry, scaly 
skin must be covered with vaseline or glycerine. 
1 Finsen, Semaine Medicale, 1894, p. 302. 
? Boisse, Bulletin des Veterinaires de 1’Armée, 1887, p. 119. 
