362 DISEASES OF BREATHING. 



are greatly dilated, and the breathing, which is always hurried 

 ic such cases, often attains a rate of over 40 respirations in the 

 minute. The constant noise and vibration on board a steamer 

 in movement makes it very difficult, when pleurisy is present, to 

 properly observe the oharaoteristic sounds of that complication, 

 which are similar to those of ordinary pleurisy. The pulse is 

 very frequent; often over 70 in the minute. Although the 

 appetite is more or less in abeyance, the patient will sometimes 

 continue to nibble his hay to the very end, and not unusually 

 dies with some hay between his teeth. As a rule, he drinks very 

 little water, apparently on account of the hurried state of his 

 breathing. The disease generally rims its course in about six 

 days, during the last two or three of which there is a watery 

 discharge from the lungs in varied quantities. Sometimes this 

 discharge merely moistens the opening of the nostrils and the 

 muzzle; but on other occasions the animal often licks it off his 

 muzzle. At first it is colourless, but later on it assumes a rusty 

 red tint, which indicates that putrefaction is present in the lungs. 

 This discharge is accompanied by g. foetid smell from the nostrils, 

 which increases in intensity according to the extent of the putre- 

 factive condition of the lungs. Occasionally, the patient dies 

 suddenly, but death as a rule is caused by exhaustion and inability 

 to get a sufficiency of air into -the lungs to sustain life. 



RATE OF MORTALITY.— The large majority, probably over 80 

 per cent., of horses affected by this disease, die. 



POST-MORTEM APPEARANCES.— Among the ordinary signs 

 of pneumonia and pleurisy, I have always found an unusually large 

 quantity of serum in the pleural cavities. Captain J. M. Christy, 

 M.R.C.V.S., tells me that he has observed a marbled condition of 

 the lungs, closely resembling that of contagious pleuro-pneumonia 

 in cattle. 



TREATMENT.— The only treatment found at all beneficial, is 

 careful nursing and change of air, for instance, to a deck above 

 the one on which the animal became affected, or from the leeward 

 to the windward side. The only way to be successful in this 

 attempt, is to begin the treatment at the onset of the disease. 

 If constipation be present, back-raking, an enema and a dose of 

 Epsom salts might be tried. As a stimulant, spirits (a quarter 

 of a pint of whisky in a pint of water) or carbonate of ammonia 

 (2 drachms in a ball) will often be useful. 



