CASK OF ITFPATIRIIHCEA. 
39 
This case seems materially to differ from those which have pre- 
ceded it, on record, in the remaining portion of the liver being to 
all appearance in a perfectly sound condition. There was nothing 
like broken down structure to be observed. The blood, which had 
from time to time become effused under the tunics of the liver, 
being unable to escape, had had its most fluid parts removed by 
absorption, its more solid portion remaining; this, by accumulation, 
had caused pressure to be imparted to the soft structures of the 
liver, and through such pressure its gradual absorption. 
The line of demarcation between the healthy and unhealthy 
parts was perfectly distinct, the slightest traction producing a sepa- 
ration, leaving an apparently healthy surface of the liver exposed to 
view. I should say that nothing less than two- thirds of the liver 
had disappeared. 
The most striking point of coincidence, in all the cases of this 
disease that have ever been brought under my notice, is its in- 
variably appearing in horses of the same temperament and habits. 
This horse, similar to all the rest, was a fine, gay-looking creature, 
full of spirits — somewhat vicious — fed voraciously — was always 
fat. When kept short of hay he would eat the most filthy litter, 
voiding his faeces in small quantities, and often always accom- 
panying the act with a half-suppressed groan, and might frequently 
be heard to sigh and turn his upper lip, particularly just after 
being turned in the stall. 
These may appear, perhaps, unimportant minutiae to recount; but 
a careful consideration of them, together with a deliberate exami- 
nation of the symptoms in illness, cannot fail to enable us to give 
a correct diagnosis ; and if a perfect knowledge of the changes 
which are passing within cannot avail us much in directing a re- 
medial plan of treatment, still the consciousness of its incurability 
will sufficiently repay us for our attention to it, by relieving us of 
those unpleasant reflections by which we are sometimes assailed 
when unable satisfactorily to ourselves to account for death previous 
to the institution of a post-mortem examination. 
December 14, 1845. 
