130 
THE INFLUENZA OF 1830. 
are the best. They rouse the stomach and bowels, and then act 
upon and give energy to other organs. The mouth should be 
moist, the skin cool, and the pulse soft, before they are given. 
The carbonate of ammonia is very useful. It appears to create 
an appetite, to allay abdominal pain, and to give the horse some 
vivacity without hardening the pulse or heating the skin. But 
I do not like it while the horse will bear bleeding. 
The complications and unusual results of Influ- 
enza are rather numerous : I can do little more than mention 
them. The Cephalic and the Thoracic are often combined from 
the beginning, and very often the latter follows the former at 
the distance of several days. When the bronchial inflammation 
becomes intense, that of the head usually declines. But if the 
patient dies, the cavities of the head, frontal and nasal, the 
trachea, and the large branches of it, are all much inflamed 
and filled with froth. This combination is very common, 
and easily understood. Pneumonia appears to be present in ail 
the cases that have rapidly run to a fatal termination. But the in- 
flammation is frequently said to be in the lungs when the discolora- 
tion arises chiefly or entirely from inflammation in the minute bron- 
chia. Founder has not been so common as it usually is in purely 
pneumonic attacks. I have had only two cases ; they were, 
however, of great weight. Abdominal pain has occurred very 
frequently. I have seen no case in which it existed at the be- 
ginning. The horse has always entered the febrile stage, and 
been in it for a day or two. Sometimes the pain is very acute ; 
sometimes merely a passing pang, producing no mischief. When 
severe and lasting, the pain always quickens and hardens the 
pulse ; and, unless quickly removed, it destroys the horse. The 
stimulating ball, composed of carbonated ammonia and allspice, 
is the best remedy I know of. The dose is four drachms of the 
former and three of the latter. The dose may be repeated every 
fifteen minutes till the pain be quelled, or till death is inevitable. 
I am at a loss to discover the cause of these pains : I used to 
attribute them to medicine previously given ; but I have seen 
them often where no medicine had been administered. Perhaps 
the large quantity of fluid contained in the bowels may excite 
distention or spasm at particular places where it accumulates. 
There is no gaseous distention. Pleuritis has occurred in three 
or four cases : in two, the patients were neglected. They were 
far gone before they came under treatment. But they seemed to 
be doing very well for two or three days, till, all at once, the 
pulse rose, hardened, and the breathing became pleuritic — 'the 
costal cartilages forming a ridge along the flank, the expiration 
prolonged, the inspiration incomplete, the flank not fairly let 
