THE VETERINARY ART IN CHINA. 
231 
the graphic art to their assistance, enabled the dumb animal to 
tell its own story in picture. The illustration is followed by some 
account of the disease, its causes, nature, and so on ; which, being 
founded upon erroneous conceptions of the living machine, is a 
curious patchwork of truth and falsehood. The pictorial repre- 
sentations amount to forty-eight. Twenty-nine diseases are con- 
sidered incurable, and are mentioned, with their proper designa- 
tions, to caution the parties concerned against a bootless expend- 
iture of time and money. The medicines prescribed are chiefly 
such as are unknown in this country if we except alum for dis- 
eases of the foot, liquorice, and a few others. Some pains were 
taken to render the draught palatable, as the drugs are ordered to 
be mingled with milk, wine, honey, and other pleasant vehicles. 
“ Two volumes are devoted to the horse, and contain much cu- 
rious if not interesting matter. I will select a few specimens in 
order to shew how a Chinese reasoned and acted in the treatment 
of a creature so useful to man as a partner in many of his labours. 
The state of the circulating system could not easily be overlooked 
by a people who affect so much delicacy in judging of the pulse, 
and so we find special directions as to the manner in which the 
three middle fingers of the right hand are to be applied along the 
course of the artery. That in the neck seems to have been 
pitched upon as the most obvious, and the most likely to tell 
the truth. About fifty spots were marked upon the skin of the 
animal, and severally distinguished by very quaint epithets, for 
the sake of pointing out the proper situations for applying a hot 
needle or bodkin : thus we observe that the Chinese were long 
since acquainted with the cruel but sometimes necessary prac- 
tice called firing. It corresponded to the use of moxa. In 
man a heap of combustible matter was ignited upon his skin ; 
in the horse a hot iron was laid upon the same part. Twenty- 
four spots are also designated for the sake of shewing where 
the surgeon ought to apply his lancet, or, as it is called, his chisel. 
The Chinese, who never had wit or courage enough to free a poor 
sufferer from a diseased part, seem to have had a mighty humour 
for torturing the healthy portions with their nine scarificators; 
and we see that they extended their kind regards to the horse, and 
doled out to him a full measure of fire and steel. They were not 
strangers to the use of the probang, and seem to have resorted to 
several methods for relieving diseases of a very decided character; 
we are, therefore, less surprised when we learn that they ven- 
tured so far as to insert an instrument into the eye of the horse in 
order to remove the opaque lens which obstructed his sight. The 
instrument used for couching was simply a needle with a small 
shaft ; it was introduced into the upper part of the eyeball. 
