EFFECTS OF MEDICINE ON HOUSES. 
621 
Cocculus Indicus. 
These berries being said to be in extensive use in breweries, in 
order to give an intoxicating property to beer, and bearing the re- 
putation, in certain quantities, of being poisonous to animals gene- 
rally, I felt very desirous, some years ago, to ascertain what their 
effects might be, when administered to horses, and whether or not 
they would turn out, medicinally, of any service in glanders. 
About this time (1821) a chestnut horse, six years old, with 
cataracts in both eyes, and labouring under symptoms of glanders, 
was sent to my father, to “cure, or have destroyed knowing that 
he was unable to perform the former, and yet, from the age and 
condition of the horse, unwilling to put him to death, he was con- 
signed to me for experiment. The horse commenced taking the 
cocculus (in combination with potash) on the 3d April, in half- 
ounce doses thrice a-day, and continued the same up to the 
28th of the month (twenty-five days) without any other effect than 
occasional symptoms of dulness and feverishness, the disease all 
the while making steady and, latterly, more rapid progress. 
Elaterium. 
I never exhibited this potent medicine to horses : I have given 
it in two instances to dogs ; and the effects proved much the same 
as in the human being. 
August 16, 1822. — A terrier bitch (named Flirt) of my own, 
received a blow upon one of her eyes, occasioning swelling and red- 
ness of the eyelids, and perfect opacity of the cornea. I offered her 
a lump of fat, in which was buried a grain of elaterium. She readily 
ate it. In two hours afterwards she vomited, ejecting a quantity 
of chymous matter, with which it was imagined must have been 
mingled the whole or the greater part of her medicine. However, 
four hours afterwards, she passed a copious liquid evacuation per 
anum, some hardened faeces having come away before it. After- 
wards she was freely purged, and derived much benefit from it. 
August 17, 1822. — The same dose was given to another bitch — 
Busy — the property of Gen. M d. An hour afterwards she 
vomited ; and this was succeeded by moderate purgation. 
Euphorbium. 
This acrid gum-resinous substance was administered by me in 
December, 1812, to a horse having glanders. It was first given 
in infusion, mingled with large quantities of water : in the course 
