47 
SCHOOL AT ALFORT, 1840-41. 
trance to the sheep-cote, and filled with a solution of lime. M. 
Delafond practised the same on 710 sheep attacked by foot-rot, 
and he found that this new way of employing the hydrate of lime 
was both simple and economical. 
The same Professor has also proved, that long and deep inci- 
sions, and reiterated application of the cautery, and irritating 
applications, were, if not injurious, at least useless in the treat- 
ment of recent or long-continued inflammation of the jugular vein. 
M. Delafond has also shewn to the students, that a great num- 
ber of cases of phlebitis, under different forms and with different 
complications, had been successfully treated by prolonged rest, 
the use of food easy of mastication, emollient anodyne lotions 
and embrocations, the opening or puncturing the fistula only to 
permit the escape of purulent matter, and, most of all, the taking 
from the animal the possibility of rubbing the diseased part. 
An epidemic disease among horses has appeared in many de- 
partments, and several cavalry regiments. This inflammatory 
affection, often wearing a mild character, at other times being 
serious and even fatal, has its seat oftenest in the lungs, and 
sometimes in the digestive passages, and frequently, all at once, in 
both of them. M. Delafond is preparing an Essay for the Royal 
and Central Society of Agriculture on this malady. 
During the last four or five years M. Delafond has observed 
on six horses an affection which he has considered to be neurosis 
of the heart. It has since appeared in our school, and after several 
relapses, the patients have been restored to perfect health. 
An agriculturist in the neighbourhood of the school had, in 
1819, a hundred pigs, which were suddenly attacked by disease, 
and they were all dead in fifteen days. In June last he bought 
another hundred, which were soon attacked, and seven of them 
died in less than forty-eight hours. M. Delafond observed in those 
that died, and on eighty-eight that yet lived, acute inflammation 
of the roof of the mouth, and of the tonsils, with the formation of 
false membranes. The Professor, assisted by two of the pupils, 
lightly cauterized the affected parts, and applied to them a mix- 
ture of honey and hydrochloride acid in such proportions as to 
produce a slight degree of causticity. Out of the eighty-eight 
that had been attacked eighty-five recovered. 
Toxicology. 
The beech mast ( fagus castanea ), which is eaten without 
danger by pigs and fowls, is a violent poison with regard to 
horses. Some veterinarians have observed, that the cake which 
remains after the pressure of the oil from the mast, given as food 
