INTO THE LEFT JUGULAR. 3B7 
in the course of the night was most restless and violent, as if she 
was labouring under violent colic. 
During the 23d she was quiet, except that several times she 
seemed to breathe with great difficulty, and panted violently 
for some minutes. 
The night between the 23d and 24th was passed in tolerable 
quietude; but the most absolute loathing of food continued from 
the moment of her first attack. 
Having heard this account of her, I proceeded to a careful ex- 
amination of her. She seemed to be very much dispirited, but 
she was quiet, except that her respiration had the peculiar 
character of broken wind : the number of respirations, however, was 
but little greater than in a state of health. Her belly was consider- 
ably distended, and evidently gave her pain even to touch it. Her 
tail had a quivering motion — • the mucous membranes were in- 
jected — and the pulse was small, hard, and slightly accelerated. 
My impression certainly was, that her disease, whatever it might 
be, was situated in the abdominal cavity, and that it consisted of 
congestion, or inflammation that had not been properly at- 
tended to in its early stage. Although the pulse was but little 
developed, and there was no decisive symptom of inflammation, 
I thought that a slight bleeding should be effected : 1 accordingly 
opened the left jugular vein, and confided to an intelligent pupil 
the task of obtaining about four and a half pounds of blood, 
while I cleaned my lancet, and looked at another patient. 
Two minutes had scarcely elapsed when he came to me and 
said that the mare appeared to be worse, and that the blood 
scarcely flowed from the vein. I ran to her, and found, to my great 
surprise, that the blood contained a considerable quantity of spume, 
and that the little that continued to flow was mixed with a great 
many air-bubbles. I observed at the same time she was stagger- 
ing — that her respiration was laborious — that her nostrils were 
dilated — her eyes fixed — the mucous membrane pale — the tongue 
hanging out — the pulse not to be felt — in a word, that death was 
near at hand. 
It was impossible for me to misunderstand the serious state of 
the affair, and you will easily comprehend how much it surprised 
and grieved me. Although I had nothing wherewith to reproach 
myself — although I had bled in my usual way, and to the extent 
which the state of the patient seemed to require, yet I felt all the 
responsibility which such a termination of the affair would bring 
upon me. A crowd of conjectures presented themselves to my 
mind. I endeavoured, but in vain, to arrive at some satisfactory 
explanation of the occurrence. I thought that there must be some 
fatality about me, that two such events should occur to me in so 
