Diseases of Sheep. 



317 



warm maslies or thin gruel. In every case where much pain is 

 evinced on touching the belly, the flanks, or any other particular 

 place, fomentations may be beneficially applied ; but all foment- 

 ing must be patiently persevered in for an hour together, or even 

 more, if it is designed to be effective. Inflammation is an un- 

 naturally increased circulation of the blood and a consequent 

 distension of the vessels. Where the part affected can be distin- 

 guished, and lies externally or superficially, fomentation pro- 

 duces local relief by removing that tenseness of the integuments 

 which excessive circulation produces ; but, in other cases, the ex- 

 cess of blood must be removed by depletion, and its renewed 

 accumulation be prevented, if possible^ by aperients and low 

 living. Being in the latter case usually accompanied by extreme 

 thirsty drenches and gruel remove this unpleasant sensation, while 

 they afford nourishment without enriching the blood. 



Cough, or Cold, will sometimes affect sheep severely. Its 

 symptoms resemble those in man, and are removed by very simi- 

 lar treatment ; but in an aggravated form it must be decidedly 

 controlled^ or it will terminate in consumption. If inflam- 

 mation shows itself decidedly about the throat and larynx, 

 attended by a violent discharge from the nose, it will be prudent 

 to bleed the sheep freely from the neck, and, by the aid of warm 

 mashes and removal to a sheltered spot, the symptoms v/ill 



* 1 have one general fault to find with the Author's treatment, namely, in 

 the case of bleeding. In my own experience, I have suffered much from 

 bleeding horses and cattle; and sheep would, I have no doubt, be injured 

 in the same degree. There is often so much apparent inflammation from 

 debility, when bleeding would be fatal, that I think he too indiscriminately 

 recommends the depletion of the system, and I perceive advises it under 

 most of his heads. In epidemics generally, unless active inflammation 

 exists, I never bleed ; and I may mention, in illustration of the principle of 

 my practice, the following striking instance in reference to this point. 

 Three years ago, when there was a disorder among coach-horses, I had 

 forty ill in ten days. One of them was bled, namely, the first that 

 was taken, and the only one that died ; for, although by the bleeding the * 

 disorder appeared to be removed, so general a weakness ensued in the case 

 of this horse, that dropsy was the result. Having paid much serious 

 attention to the nature of the complaint, and feeling confident in my own 

 mind that much of the apparent inflammation arose from general debility 

 of the whole system — an opinion in which I am confirmed by knowing 

 several people whose horses had been attacked before my own, and their 

 stock sacrificed to a considerable amovuit by injudicious bleeding — I took 

 the other way, and gave each of the horses, as they became severally affected, 

 a quart of good ale, with ginger and other spices, and two quarts of oatmeal 

 gruel : the consequence was, that there was not a single horse that did not 

 recover under this mode of treatment ; and, I may add, that although I gene- 

 ra Iv-keep about a hundred horses, I have not allowed one of them to be bled 

 for the last two years, and since the discontinuance of bleeding I have not 

 had half the number of cases of swelled legs and grease I previously had. 

 — W. Greaves. 



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