240 DISEASES OF THE HOKSE. 



cystitis has been observed. The adipose tissue throughout, the carcass 

 may show a pronounced icteric appearance in certain cases. On re- 

 moving the bones of the skull the brain appears to be normal macro- 

 scopically in a few instances, but in most cases the veins and capil- 

 laries of the meninges of the cerebrum, cerebellum, and occasionally 

 the medulla is distinctly dilated and engorged, and in a few cases 

 there are' pronounced lesions of a leptomeningitis. An excessive quan- 

 tity of cerebrospinal fluid is present in most of the cases. On the 

 floor of the lateral ventricles of several brains there was noted a slight 

 softening caused by hemorrhages into the brain substance. There is 

 always an abundance of fluid in the subarachnoid spaces, ventricles, 

 and at the base of the brain, usually of the color of diabetic urine, 

 and containing a limited number of flocculi, but in a few cases it was 

 slightly blood tinged. The spinal cord was not found involved in the 

 few cases examined. 



Treatment. — One attack of the disease does not confer immunity. 

 Horses have been observed which have recovered from two attacks, 

 and still others that recovered from the first but died as a result of 

 the second attack. 



Inasmuch as a natural immunity does not appear after an attack 

 of cerebrospinal meningitis, it might be anticipated that serum 

 of recovered cases would possess neither curative nor prophylactic 

 qualities. Nevertheless, experiments have been made along these 

 lines with serum from recovered cases, but without any positive 

 results. Similar investigations have been conducted by others in 

 Europe with precisely the same results. With the tendency of the 

 disease to produce pathological lesions in the central nervous system, 

 it seems scarcely imaginable that a medicinal remedy will be found 

 to heal these foci, and even when recovery takes place considerable 

 disturbance in the functions, as blindness, partial paralysis, dumb- 

 ness, etc., is liable to remain. Indeed, when the disease once be- 

 comes established in an animal, drugs seem to lose their physio- 

 logical action. Therefore, with all the previously mentioned facts 

 before us, it is evident that the first principle in the treatment of 

 this disease is prevention, which consists in the exercise of proper 

 care in feeding only clean, well-cured forage and grain and pure 

 water. These measures when faithfully carried out check the de- 

 velopment of additional cases of the disease upon the affected 

 premises. , 



While medicinal treatment has proved unsatisfactory in most 

 cases, nevertheless the first indication is to clean out the digestive 

 tract thoroughly, and to accomplish this prompt measures must be 

 used early in the disease. Active and concentrated remedies should 

 be given, preferably subcutaneously or intravenously, owing to the 

 great difficulty in swallowing, even in the early stage. Arecolin in 



