518 



On Mismanagement of Farm- Horses. 



or when its injurious consequences are aggravated by other errors 

 in management, it leads to still greater evils, some of which mav 

 be here enumerated. The gradual removal of the fat and 

 shrinking of the muscles produce extreme emaciation; the 

 digestive system loses its tone ; and diarrhoea, and even dysentery, 

 appear, which rapidly reduce the fast- failing strength. The blood 

 is thin and watery, and passes through the walls of its vessels, 

 causing serous swellings in various of the dependent parts of the 

 body, as in the limbs and about the sheath. This impoverished 

 state of body especially favours the production of two very serious 

 diseases, namely, tubercular consumption and glanders. These 

 affections owe their origin to similar causes : their existence in- 

 dicates a deteriorated and vitiated state of the blood, and their 

 cure is all but hopeless. 



Tubercular consumption is of less frequent occurrence in 

 horses than either in the human subject or in cattle, and is rarely 

 seen except in animals in which there is a strong constitutional 

 predisposition to it. If this latent predisposition be excited in 

 early life, the disease generally attacks the mesenteric glands 

 and mucous follicles of the small intestines ; these become en- 

 larged, and filled with unhealthy pus and tubercular matter ; the 

 lacteal vessels are unable to take up the nutritive portions of the 

 food, and the animal dies of inanition. In advanced life the 

 tubercular deposits are more abundant in the organs of respira- 

 tion. A gluey fibrinous matter appears on the surface of the 

 mucous membrane lining the air-cells and the smaller bronchii. 

 The more fluid portions of this are absorbed ; and there rem^ains 

 a greyish yellow, cheese-like mass, incapable of organization, and 

 containing numerous gritty inorganic particles. After a variable, 

 but generally considerable time, these tubercles run on to un- 

 healthy suppuration ; large portions of the lungs become quite 

 inadequate to the performance of their functions ; the quantity 

 of the circulating fluids is lessened by diarrhosa and dropsical 

 effusions, and death results from extreme exhaustion. It is stated 

 by Dr. Alison that the causes of pulmonary consumption and 

 scrofulous diseases ^'^may be all ranked together as causes of 

 debility acting permanently or habitually for a length of time, 

 although not so powerfully as to produce sudden or violent 

 effects." *^ But there are few more powerful causes of debility 

 than imperfect nourishment, and therefore we can scarcely deny 

 its great influence in contributing to develop these intractable 

 diseases. Indeed, it is w<3ll knovm that such diseases are re- 

 markably common amongst badly-fed portions of the population, 

 and that even amongst the most healthy inmates of prisons a 



* Watson's Principles and Practice of Pliysic, 3rd edition, vol. i. p. 203. 



