CASE OF RUPTURE OF THE SPLEEN. 
153 
ground oats once a-day, which she seemed to mumble with hearty 
appetite (she had no upper incisors, and many of the molar teeth of 
the under jaw were worn to the stumps). After the weather waxed 
more inclement I housed her at night, giving her a bucketful of 
bran mash, with a bountiful allowance of crushed oats, and a hand- 
ful of malt steeped therein, and as much chopped straw, with a little 
bran, split beans, and oats, as she chose to eat, with now and then a 
handful of new' hay. Let me observe, by the way, that it was 
wheaten, and not oat straw, as experience proves that the latter 
is apt to set horses’ teeth on edge ; an action which, I strongly sus- 
pect, is also attributable to fog-grass : at all events, the mare could 
not grind her food half so well immediately after she was housed, 
as she did in the course of a fortnight after — a phenomenon 
whereof I was both ear and eye-witness. Under the above treat- 
ment I thought she began to shew thriftier signs ; her coat prof- 
fered to moult, and the charge, in consequence, gradually loosening 
its hold, with the help of a lusty roll over (a feat duly performed 
by her the first thing after being turned out in the morning), 
came away about five days ago. 
Nothing had hitherto occurred to awaken any serious misgivings 
as to the probable issue of her present time of gestation, which 
was to expire on the 3d of April. It is true that, on one or two 
occasions, I saw, or fancied I saw, a faint inclination to strike her 
belly with her off hind leg, and a transient leer of momentary pain 
on her countenance, half averted to her flanks. I set this down, 
however, but as the promptings of an over-curious jealousy. Her 
dung was soft, and almost pultaceous; and, if not so critically 
digested as I could have wished, yet was correspondent enough 
with her powers of mastication. Her few handfuls of new hay, 
nevertheless, I ordered to be discontinued; and that she did not 
mind its withdrawal, her preference, when both were at her option, 
of the cut stuff and oats, plainly attested. She certainly was more 
listless in her manner, nor did she attack her food with quite that 
eager zest that she had betrayed during the winter of 1848-9 ; but 
then she was older, was breeding the second consecutive year, and 
was supplied more frequently with it. Now for the catastrophe. 
On Sunday, the I Oth instant, my other duties disabled me from 
seeing her. On the following morning, having eaten her usual 
feed, she was taken to her paddock about 9 o’clock, A.M. ; but the 
day being squally, with showers of sleet, and her back denuded of 
its weather fence, she was put in a roomy loose box there, in com- 
pany with a three-year-old filly that had contracted a warm attach- 
ment to her, and with whom she was always on the best of terms. 
About 12 o’clock the servant had to take oatmeal gruel up for four 
suckers (her own filly being one), who were also domiciled in the 
VOL. XXIII. Y 
