632 
OBSERVATIONS ON COLIC. 
specting it more accurately, in vain was the effort made ; it could 
not be stirred. The attachments were thought not to have been 
separated ; but all were found to be free, and it was the weight 
alone which disabled me from lifting it. It required the assist- 
ance of another man to effect its removal, and the interior was 
found to be packed full of solid food : I could not have believed 
a horse’s stomach could have contained one-half the quantity. It 
was such a mass as would have crammed the ample rumen of a 
cow. 
The lining membrane of the stomach was inflamed, and so, like- 
wise, was that of the intestines ; but the inflammation was diffused, 
and nowhere intense. The colon was almost as loaded as the 
stomach, and in several places the ingesta, where the gut had 
contracted, were perfectly dry, while, in general, they were moist 
and pultaceous. 
Such were the principal features brought to light by the inspec- 
tion of the body, and none are of that character which can be sup- 
posed to have arisen from accidental causes. Every thing found 
must be allowed to have existed during life. Then here, I ask, 
what was the cause of death! The inflammation, though widely 
spread, was hardly well-established. We well know, affections 
of the bowels will destroy horses in a few hours ; but, then, the in- 
testines are thickened and discoloured to a degree that explains 
the death. In this case, however, with no thickening of the coats, 
and only such change of colour as denoted the beginning of dis- 
ease, in an hour and a half life was dismissed. Clearly, the in- 
flammation could not be the cause of so speedy a termination ; and, 
rejecting that, the history obtained and the excessive quantity of 
ingesta found alone remain to solve the mystery. 
The horse had been ill for some time previous. From that 
attack it was thought to have recovered, but the digestive organs 
had not regained their tone. The animal, to get it fit to work, was 
freely fed, and no doubt the groom rejoiced to see it gorge, think- 
ing the more it ate the greater would be its strength. Rack and 
manger were loaded night and day, and the morbid appetite of the 
convalescent animal was subject to no restraint. The stomach was 
distended, and the intestines crammed until the parts were para- 
lyzed, and had lost all power to appropriate or expel that which 
oppressed them. The horse got loose in the night, but from the 
teeth, judging by the sign to which I have alluded, it did not then 
appear to have eaten. The aloes, then, were acting as nauseants, 
and nothing, which at that period could have been found, was after 
death seen in the stomach. Probably, while free, nothing was 
touched, and no quantity that can be supposed possible for a horse 
