564 Veterinary Obstetrics 



meconium which has become accumulated in the intestinal tract. 

 Clinically this theory is apparently not so important as some per- 

 sons would have us believe. The udder of the mare frequently 

 becomes so distended that the milk flows out in large quantities 

 for hours, days'or even weeks before the birth of the foal. Yet 

 this does not seem to have any very definite relation to the reten- 

 tion of the meconium, although we would assume that the colos- 

 trum has wholly disappeared before the birth of the foal. As 

 the foal is born with the rectum impacted with hard masses of 

 meconium, the condition is not acquired after birth through the 

 absence of the colostrum, and we are unable to see clinically that 

 the retention is any more probable or serious in the foal of a 

 mare from which the colostrum has escaped than in those in- 

 stances where the reverse is true. 



The artificial feeding of the new-born has until recently 

 been considered a difiicult and uncertain task. The chief diffi- 

 culty has been in reference to the question of intestinal infection 

 because of contaminated food. The comparative composition of 

 the milk from various species of animals has been well studied and 

 understood, and attempts have been made in artificial feeding to 

 modify the milk by the addition of sugar, water or other normal 

 constituents in amounts which would cause it to approach ap- 

 proximately the composition of that of the species to which 

 the young animal belongs. Thus, in case of the artificial feed- 

 ing of a foal upon cow's milk, the milk is diluted with 10 to 20 % 

 of water, and sugar is added, in order to have it approach the 

 composition of the milk of the mare. This is attempted under 

 the assumption that the young of a given species thrives best 

 upon the milk derived from that species, and next best upon a 

 milk which has been artificially modified to closely resemble that 

 of the mother of the new-born animal. This artificial change in 

 the composition of milk has not produced the satisfactory results 

 which, for a time, were expected and, although important, is 

 not of the same value as the control of the bacterial contents of 

 the milk. 



At present we place the chief emphasis in artificial feeding 

 upon the question of having the milk, as far as possible, free from 

 the presence of pathogenic bacteria. Hence it is aimed to keep 

 the milk, and the vessels from which it is fed, scrupuously clean. 



