TREATMENT OF SPAVIN. 
603 
the discharge abated ; and on the fourth day after being fired the 
animal was seized with oppression in his breathing, manifesting 
symptoms of fever, loss of spirits and appetite, &c. Feeling 
alarmed at this attack, his owner called on me to come and con- 
sult with him on the case. This was about nine o’clock on the 
morning of the fifth day. I found the patient breathing hard 
and oppressively, with dilated nostrils, through which the Schnei- 
derian membrane was seen red, like scarlet; and it was told me 
he had ejected through his nose, a little while before, a frothy 
coffee-coloured fluid, having a disagreeable odour. The hind 
limbs were swollen to that degree, that the thighs partook of the 
tumefaction ; but the swelling of the fore limbs had not as yet 
reached the arms. His pulse was not more than 60. But there 
was an expression of pain and anxiety in his countenance too 
significant to be mistaken, and he was restless, though loose in 
his box ; ever and anon looking back at his flanks, or, in dis- 
tress, thrusting his nose out at the door of his box, seeking the 
cold air. His legs were with all possible haste got into warm 
baths, and he was bled, and took, medicine, & c. The blood, as it 
flowed, proved treacley in consistence, dark even to blackness, and 
quickly congealed; though, after all, the coagulum turned out any 
thing but a firm one. No relief being obtained through the day 
by what had been done in the morning, at half-past seven o’clock 
at night he was bled again. Now, however, a gallon of blood was 
with great difficulty obtained. After this the mucous membranes 
became pale — the mouth and lips and extremities cold — the pupils 
dilated — respiration hurried. At nine o’clock all his symptoms 
had increased. His flanks were now beating at the rate of 66 per 
minute — his pulse was imperceptible at the jaw, and at the heart 
beating too feebly and flutteringly to be distinctly counted. After- 
wards, he broke out, over his whole body, into a profuse sweat. 
His extremities had a deathlike feel — his eyes staring, wild, and 
delirious-looking — the pupils unaffected even by the light of a 
candle. At twelve o’clock he died. Thus, in seventeen hours from 
his first manifestation of constitutional irritation, was this wretched 
horse a dead carcass. The 'post-mortem appearances — such, at 
least, as could be viewed as the result of so short an illness — ■ 
consisted in morbid aspects of the air-passages, pleura, and lungs. 
The lining membrane of the trachea and bronchial tubes had 
turned black from inflammation, appearing as though mortification 
had actually taken, or was on the eve of taking, place. There was 
also some effusion into the substance of the lungs, though these 
organs were in a tuberculous condition from former disease. 
The above case is instructive to us in a double point of view. 
First, it teaches us caution in blistering — and a fortiori in firing 
— horses, and especially warns us against doing so in the four 
