534 



On Mismanagement of Farm,- Horses. 



catarrh, namely^ effusion and fever. The particular symptoms 

 are modified by the structure and functions of the parts affected, 

 and are described in detail in most treatises on veterinary science. 

 Other parts of the respiratory apparatus besides the mucous 

 membrane are also apt to suffer from inclemency of weather. 

 Horses exposed to low temperatures or stormy winds, or placed 

 in currents of cold air, especially when the vital functions are in 

 a state of depression, are sometimes attacked by pneumonia or in- 

 flammation of the substance of the lungs, but still more frequently 

 by pleurisy or inflammation of the serous membrane which 

 covers these important organs, and is reflected over the inner 

 walls of the chest. Diseases of the respiratory organs, produced 

 by exposure, exhibit some characteristic features, which dis- 

 tinguish them from the same class of diseases resulting from 

 other causes. These diseases affect, to a greater or less degree, 

 almost all parts of the respiratory apparatus ; the mucous mem- 

 brane is involved throughout most of its extent, from the nostrils 

 to the ultimate air-cells, as also the tissue of the lungs and their 

 serous covering; and death usually results from suffocation, caused 

 by the large quantity of frothy mucus poured into the trachea 

 and bronchii. 



Many of the diseases affecting the eye often originate from in- 

 sufficient shelter. There is no cause of simple ophthalmia or in- 

 flammation of the conjunctiva — the mucous membrane of the eye 

 — so frequent as cold. Nor is it an unfrequent cause of that 

 more serious and deep-seated inflammation of the eye, known 

 amongst veterinarians by the name of specific ophthalmia. When 

 the exciting cause is slight, and its continuance transient, the 

 more external of these inflammations is generally produced ; but 

 when very intense, or of long continuance, the more deep-seated 

 usually occurs. The latter is often attended by very aggravated 

 symptoms, is tedious and troublesome of cure, apt to induce 

 cataract, and always predisposes the eye to suffer from a return of 

 the inflammation. 



The influence of weather on affections of the bowels is not so 

 obvious as on those of the respiratory organs. The same incle- 

 ment weather which produces in most horses catarrh, bron- 

 chitis, or pleurisy, occasionally gives rise to enteritis. This is 

 most apt to attack horses with flat ribs, and those subject to in- 

 digestion and colic. Such cases of enteritis are exactly similar to 

 those produced by other causes. They are characterised by the 

 same symptoms, require the same treatment, and run their course 

 with the same frightful rapidity, sometimes destroying life in six 

 or eight hours. When horses are plentifully supplied with good 

 food, steady and continued cold rarely causes diarrhcea. This 

 affection, however, is frequently produced by sudden alternations 



