24 
ON FUNGUS HAEMATODES. 
By Mr. J. D Harrison, V.S., Southport 
AMONG the catalogue of diseases to which human nature is 
liable, we find very few which present such remarkable features, 
and which are generally so unmanageable or so apt to be con- 
founded with other maladies that, in common with it, possess at 
their commencement certain peculiarities nearly approximating, but 
which are at the same time sufficiently diagnostic of its true cha- 
racter to the practised eye, as the one which I am about to endeavour 
to elucidate. If, in so doing, truth compels me in one case to con- 
fess my ignorance of the true character of the disease and my total 
inability of affording relief in another case, the recital of such failures 
may be beneficial, when, by exciting the attention of the profession, 
and leading them to a more minute and careful examination of tu- 
mours than has been generally practised, the disease becomes re- 
cognized and better known among us, and its diagnosis more firmly 
established. We should then be able, by our prognosis in future 
cases, to establish our characters as men of science, and by operating 
in a skilful manner rescue many poor animals from the effects of 
this malignant complaint, and thus escape that compunction which 
any man not destitute of the common feelings of humanity must 
experience when to his ignorance the premature death of a valu- 
able animal is attributable. As a beacon, therefore, to others, the 
two following cases of fungus hsematodes are exhibited to the pro- 
fession. 
Case I. — In the latter end of February 1835, a bay horse, aged 
four years, was brought to me, having a tumour on the anterior part 
of the left or near shoulder, about the size of a goose-egg. He had 
also another, considerably less, in the immediate neighbourhood of 
the sheath ; but as it did not cause the least inconvenience, its re- 
moval was not proposed. That which was situated on the shoulder 
was a great bar to the animal’s performance of his accustomed work, 
the collar when on him pressing on the tumour and preventing his 
drawing with his usual vigour, which made his owner anxious that 
it should be removed. Upon examining it, I found it hard, move- 
able, and no sensibility expressed from pressure, and I therefore 
concluded that it was only an encysted tumour. The operation 
was simple, and consisted in making a perpendicular incision over 
the tumour, and without difficulty separating it from its attach- 
ments with the finger, when it slipped out of its cyst as an acorn 
from its cup. The edges of the wound were kept clean, and occa- 
sionally dressed with the solutio cupri sulph., and in eight or nine 
days was perfectly healed, and the horse at work. 
