ON LARYNGITIS. 
29 
primary agent. How far this cruel mode of training is justifiable, 
we leave to the feelings of society individually. It may be said 
in one respect as a palliative for such, that, in those animals, 
though age may overtake them, their eyes become dim, and their 
force abated, they are well taken care off. Though they become 
gaunt and lean and feeble, every thing is provided for them, and, 
when exhausted, they may drag their wearied limbs to the corner 
of an elegant caravan — but not to the haunt from which they once 
went forth in the pride of their strength, and when their voices 
scattered horror through the desert — there to die a lingering and 
painful domesticated death. Better, we think, would it be for them 
did they fall by the javelin of the hunter in a state of freedom 
than thus drain to the dregs a most miserable existence, entirely to 
please the appetites of a wonder-seeking public. “ Merciful, truly 
merciful,” it has been well observed, “ is the law that subjects the 
brute creation to accumulated chances of premature death, and well 
would it be for all of them if the term of their natural though 
limited existence could always be obtained. The scenes of carnage 
which the economy of nature presents, the warfare of species with 
species, and the never-ceasing destruction of life which thus takes 
place, could alone prove the antidotes to the continued perpetuation 
of this refined misery and protracted suffering. Death would then 
come unlooked for ; up to the last moments of existence, the en- 
joyments of being would be experienced, and every instinct obey- 
ed ; death would come unlooked-for, and its bitterness would pass 
in a moment.” 
ON LARYNGITIS. 
By C. PERCIVALL, Esq., VS., Royal Horse Infirmary, 
Woolwich. 
A BAY gelding, five years old, was admitted into the infirmary 
stables at this place on the 22d of October, 1840, with the above 
disease in a very marked form. A few days prior to his admission 
I was requested to visit him by the gentleman on whose farm he 
had been at grass during the summer, having been attacked shortly 
after he was brought into the stable. At first sight there did not 
appear to be much amiss; but upon giving him a handful of corn or 
a little hay, he appeared to have great difficulty in breathing, sore- 
ness and tenderness about the throat, and evident uneasiness in 
swallowing. I ordered him to be bled, the throat to be blistered, and 
to have some laxative medicine, which was done under the super- 
