ON THE MARSH DISEASE IN THE HORSE. 
177 
or less number of beasts, according to the extent of their property. 
They can, if they please, sell that right. The breeders in my can- 
ton and the neighbouring ones often purchase that right, and 
stock it with colts, for which they cannot elsewhere find sufficient 
food. They derive considerable profit, from this when the season 
is dry; but if it should be rainy, they will often have cause to 
repent, for most of the colts have the marsh disease. The climate, 
the fogs, and the herbs that a marsh land produces are the chief 
causes of the malady. I have also had occasion to treat the same 
disease in colts bred upon the hills, and in dry seasons. In them 
it has appeared to me to be caused by too great a quantity of drink, 
sometimes of a bad quality, and by sudden stoppage of the per- 
spiration, too readily produced in the broiling days and the cold 
nights of autumn. 
This malady, which bears considerable resemblance to anasarca, 
is most prevalent in the winter. It rarely attacks colts above 
three years old. In the department of La Manche, they are never 
stabled until they are fit for work, i. e. two or three years old : 
before this they are always at grass, and then their hair acquires 
in autumn a length of three or four inches. They are, consequently, 
too hot in the day, and this long hair, humid with sweat, remains 
cold on the skin during a great part of the night. They are seldom 
daily seen, for, disposed for mischief, they are not easily approached, 
and their long hair prevents the recognition of the early symptoms 
of the disease. In addition to this, the causes of the disease are 
not easily discovered. 
The first symptoms, when they are recognised, are gradual loss 
of spirit and strength, a rough coat, great thirst, little appetite, 
and the pellets of dung a little soft : but that which is most cha- 
racteristic, even before any swelling is perceivable, is the pain 
which the animal expresses when the croup is pressed upon at the 
commencement of the tail, or the chest towards the commencement 
of the withers. These parts, together with the belly, become the 
seat of greater or less oedema. The limbs likewise begin to swell, 
particularly the hind legs. The colts, which a little time before 
were chasing each other over the pasture, have lost all their spirit 
and courage, and are covered with perspiration after the slightest 
exertion. The mucous membranes are pale to a degree that would 
be scarcely credible. The appetite continues to diminish, but 
does not altogether leave them. It would seem that the produce 
of nutrition goes to the supply of that quantity of serosity which 
the meshes of the subcutaneous cellular tissue in different parts 
contain. 
If the disease continues to progress, the croup becomes rounded 
and projecting — on the shoulders and withers soft tumours, very 
