136 PLEURISY. 
owner is capricious; the animal whose work is uncertain; the quad- 
ruped which now is idle, and now is required to make good the lost 
time,—is the living being prepared to exhibit any slow disorder—to 
consume itself with the disease which an existence, properly treated, 
would possess the energy to resist. 
Is it strange, that a creature doomed to so much and such deep sub- 
serviency, occasionally fails, even when possessed by what men call the 
best of masters? Is it just reason for wonder, that flesh occasionally 
rebels against the treatment which human ignorance subjects it to? 
Were the horse not a very hardy animal, were not the life implanted 
as firmly as the frame is set, it would not survive a tithe part of the 
usage it now endures, and, notwithstanding, continues to live on and to 
obey. 
PLEURISY. 
This most painful disease, like those of the lungs generally, visits 
valuable horses during the years when they are most esteemed. The 
unbroken colt is seldom attacked, and the aged animal is, to an almost 
equal degree, exempt. The young steed, newly stabled, is liable; and 
that liability remains up to the sixth year, when it gradually subsides. 
It is a terrible affliction. Its anguish is localized and concentrated. It 
is inflammation of the fine, glistening membrane covering the lungs and 
lining the inside of the chest. At every inspiration and at every expira- 
tion the inflamed surfaces must move upon each other. To breathe is 
the primary necessity of the creature’s life. It cannot exist and refuse 
to inflate the lungs; yet is existence purchased at a price worth many 
years of happiness. The inflamed surfaces cannot remain quiet; yet, to 
render the condition of motion the more acute, inflammation stops the 
secretion, which, during health, smoothed and lubricated the passage of 
the membranes. During disease, the pleura is swollen, rough, and dry; 
it grates or scratches as one surface is, by the necessity to breathe, 
dragged over the other. 
Membranes are sensitive in disease in proportion to the fineness of 
their structure, and to their insensibility during health. The pleura 
belongs to what are termed serous membranes. These line closed 
cavities; as the chest, the abdomen, and the joints. Of the existence 
of none of these are we conscious while they are free from disease ; but, 
let the inflammation set in, and it would be difficult to decide which of 
them is the most painful. Fortunately, however, pleurisy, when concen- 
trated or singly present, terminates generally by the second day. 
The symptoms, therefore, are quickly developed. The violence on 
their first appearance has been so great, that an attack of pleurisy has 
