CONTRIBUTIONS TO ZOOLOGICAL PATHOLOGY. 
69 
supposed that oedema of their structure is more likely to occur in 
them than in the solidungulae or graminivora ; but as there is a 
striking analogy in all these classes in this respect, if so rapidly 
a fatal termination of life can occur in the one from such a cause, 
it will also happen in the others. 
Having thus premised these few statements in reference to the 
normal structure, I shall now give the particulars of the case in 
point. 
In the month of July last, one of the American spotted cats, the 
jaguar (felis onca) belonging to the Zoological Gardens of this city, 
was, to the surprise of the keeper, found dead in her apartment in 
the morning, having been shut up the previous evening after 
having had her food put beside her, and left in a state of perfect 
health. She was about four years of age, three of which had been 
spent in the establishment, without having been at all complaining. 
On the evening before her death she was fed at her usual time, 
on cow-flesh, cut into small pieces and placed on the floor of her 
den, which, it must be observed, was dusted over with saw-dust. 
She took her food well, though rapidly and greedily, but without 
the slightest apparent difficulty in respiration or deglutition. 
During her meal she was closed up for the night, and in the morn- 
ing she was found dead and rigid on the floor, with her head tossed 
upwards and backwards, and her limbs spasmodically stretched 
out and rigid. Though there was a slight degree of warmth in the 
carcass, yet it was evident that she had been dead for several 
hours. 
In the afternoon of the same day a post-mortem examination 
took place, in which I was kindly assisted by Professor Dick, 
who is at all times ready to lend his valuable assistance and ex- 
tensive experience in unravelling cases of doubt and difficulty, 
and on which he brings to bear the resources of a well-stored mind, 
aided by the consummate tact of a most skilful anatomist and prac- 
tical pathologist. All the essentially vital organs of the body were 
most minutely examined, but without eliciting any real cause that 
could, in the slightest degree, account for the suddenness of her 
death. 
The brain and its membranes, however, were more congested 
than usual ; the cavities of the pleurrn contained a small quantity 
of fluid, such as is often at a post-mortem appearance ; the lungs 
were more congested than usual, but from the existence of several 
cicatrised cavities of long duration in both of them, with a con- 
siderable degree of concomitant grey hepatization, this active 
hyperenial state was not so great as it might have been. The 
bronchial tubes contained a small quantity of frothy fluid, slightly 
tinged with blood, and their lining membrane, and that of the 
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