16 
THE VETERINARY ART IN INDIA. 
is violent, cover part of the eye to protect it from the rays of 
light, which at this time increase the degree of irritation. 
He seldom perspires, and when he does it is to excess, which 
is, perhaps, a proof that the disease is not simply local, but affects 
the constitution. Sometimes it attacks one eye only, and on losing 
blood and being purged, it disappears, and again makes its ap- 
pearance in four or five weeks, when the other eye becomes af- 
fected, thus changing periodically until one or both eyes fall a victim 
to its malignancy*. 
The intervening periods of this disease have been supposed to 
be influenced by the moon ; thus this appearance or stage of the 
disease has been termed by farriers moon blindness. The inflam- 
mation is sometimes so great, that a deposit of lymph, or white- 
looking matter, may be observed at the edge of the pupil, generally 
the inner angle, as well as on the small glandular bodies observed 
in the pupil. I would recommend this last symptom to be care- 
fully examined, as it is the never-failing criterion of succeeding 
blindness, or the formation of a cataract, which last, though 
treated generally as a separate disease, is but the termination of 
this ; and whenever the malady intervenes at short periods, a 
cataract is to be expectedt. 
Independent of the usual remedies prescribed for the cure of 
this disease, recourse has in vain been resorted to every local ap- 
plication. Messrs. Phipps and Wathen’s medicines have been tried. 
We have scarified and divided with a lancet the larger vessels 
going to the eyes. The carotids, which supply the head and eyes 
with blood, have been tied up, but the blood was soon supplied in an 
equal quantity by anastomosing or corresponding branches. There- 
fore, to ensure permanent success, we must not rely on local ap- 
plications alone, but combine them with constitutional remedies. 
The unfavourable account which I have given the reader of this 
disease will, I hope, not discourage him from paying every attention 
to the animal labouring under it, for by proper treatment the habit 
is frequently rectified, and the disease perfectly eradicated : besides 
which, the inflammation may possibly proceed from the admixture 
of part of his gram, or some other external violence ; although, as I 
have before observed, this is not so frequent as is generally ima- 
gined. 
* These symptoms sometimes appear and disappear in twenty-four hours. 
f Mr. Coleman thinks the ophthalmia in the horse is not of the same spe- 
cific nature as that in the human subject, or any other in the known animal 
world. He conceived it to be a kind of gouty inflammation peculiar to the 
horse. 
A cataract is an opacity of the crystalline lens, or its covering : sometimes 
the crystalline lens becoming absorbed, as is observed in blind horses, whose 
eyes are so much perished as to be scarcely discernible. 
