DISCREPANCY OF PROFESSIONAL EVIDENCE. 237 
with most desire at the ears of straw scattered about his bed. His 
cough has grown harder and more frequent; his throat is sore; and 
his respiration has become disturbed, though this last alteration 
passes unnoticed by the groom. A “ hot mash” is given him, which 
he turns away from; and he is made as warm and “comfortable” 
as possible by clothing and hand-Zubbing and bandaging, and stop- 
ping up every hole and crevice through which any cold air might 
enter the stable, or any heated air might escape out of it. The day 
after, the animal’s cold is “ worse.” The groom gives him cordials 
to “ comfort” him ; and tells his master he must not take him out 
to-day. Another day comes ; the horse is no better. The master 
begins to grow uneasy about him. The groom consoles him by 
the assurance that “ the cold must run its course.” The horse con- 
tinues to be “ composed” by cordials, and in this manner is left to 
pass another night. The break of the next day, however, displays 
a scene in the stable which quite alarms the groom. The horse, 
he runs and tells his master, is “ taken worse.” The master bids 
him instantly to send for the farrier. Acute pleuro-pneumonia has 
set in. Five days afterwards — ^making the period a week from his 
first evincing signs of indisposition — the horse dies. The day be- 
fore death a veterinary surgeon had been sent for. By this time, 
however, the case was hopeless, and the veterinary surgeon had 
told the master so : and this morning he repeats his visit but to 
find the animal dead. He abides, however, the post-mortem in- 
spection. 
The chest being opened, the usual relics of pleurisy present 
themselves. Plastic masses of effused lymph are adhering in 
patches to the lungs and ribs ; and from them are stretching across, 
looking like hangings of drapery, from one to the other, ragged 
processes of the same ; and the cavities of the chest are half or 
three parts filled with serous fluid (water). The lungs appear 
compressed by the fluid ; their substance is redder than natural, 
and in places where the redness is greatest they manifest a normal 
solidity of substance. The bronchial tubes, when cut open, display 
likewise reddening, and contain frothy purulent matter. The far- 
rier, who was present, now, together with the veterinary surgeon, 
sees ample reason in all this for pronouncing the horse’s disease 
to have been of old date, and past cure at the time he was called 
in ; in fact, that the animal was “ rotten.” 
