Influenza in Horses. 
201 
control over the motions of the limbs) — in fine, a combination of the 
ills which flesh is heir to. Some, and, perhaps, most of those who 
had thought a great deal about it, had no reply at all to offer. 
Exactly the samequerieswhich were pot, and differently answered, 
in regard to influenza of man, have been asked in respect to the 
disease in the horse :— What is its nature 1 Does it spread by con- 
tagion or infection, or under the influence of some infecting atmo- 
spheric wave ? No satisfacrory solution of the problem has yet heen 
given. Practical veterinary surgeons hold quite opposite views on 
the question of contagion and infection, and facts in the history of 
the disease may he advanced to favour either view. 
On all the points above referred to, valuable information has 
been communicated by the District Veterinary Surgeons attached to 
the Society. More than fifty reports were received from Bedford, 
Berks, Cambridge, Cheshire, Cornwall, Cumberland, Derby, Dorset, 
Durham, Essex, Gloucester, Herts, Huntingdon, Kent, Leicester, 
Middlesex, Monmouth, Northampton, Norfolk, Notts, Northumber- 
land, Oxford, Rutland, Shropshire, Surrey, Somerset, Sussex, Wales, 
Wilts, Westmoreland, and York. 
In some districts influenza has shown the usual catarrhal form, 
while in others no catarrhal symptoms were present. Pulmonary, 
biliary, and enteric complications were met with in many cases. 
Abscesses under the jaw, simulating strangles, existed in a few 
instances. Pink Eye was observed in comparatively few cases in 
the last outbreak. But most of the reports refer to the extreme 
depression which accompanies and follows the attack, and in some 
of them it is recorded that rheumatism was a common sequel, which 
considerably retarded the recovery of the patient. 
All the reports agree in the statement that, under proper manage- 
ment, a fatal termination was quite exceptional. Good nursing, the 
administration of small doses of salines — as sulphate of magnesia — 
occasional employment of stimulating liniments to the throat and 
chest, and, in the convalescent stage, liberal rations, with tonics, con- 
stitute the favourite and successful system of treatment of influenza. 
Bleeding, purging, and blistering — the sheet-anchors of the medicine- 
man of the old school— are means which, in this disease, only tend 
to increase the prostration, and defeat the restorative efforts of 
Nature. 
It may be asserted without any hesitation, that the outbreak of 
influenza among horses in this country in the Autumn and Winter of 
1889 was in no way remarkable in comparison with previous great 
outbreaks in past years. The disease presented all the phases which 
have long been familiar to veterinary surgeons. In regard to the 
outbreak of the so-called influenza among men, the element of 
novelty was present in a high degree. In many of its features the 
disease of man closely resembled the malady of the horse, but there 
was nothing to justify even a remote suspicion that the two were 
communicable from the one subject to the other. It seems hardly 
worth while to suggest that both of the affections were probably due 
to some unrecognised atmospheric conditions. Nevertheless, there 
