DISEASED LUNGS, AND DEATH. 
721 
had fallen down several times this morning, and now drew her breath 
laboriously. I saw that it was all over with her, and that mortification 
was taking place, and therefore advised that she should be destroyed. 
She was accordingly led into the stack-yard, where I shot her through 
the brain, and she died instantly. 
Examination . — All about the head, face, and neck there was 
immense effusion (an inch thick) of lymph and serum; but the parts 
situated in the neighbourhood of the place where the vein was dis- 
eased, and below the bifurcation, was a mass of putridity, and only 
about one-and-a-half inch of the vein could be discovered, and 
that was situated just immediately above where the original upper 
puncture had been made, and which was still pervious, but thickened 
and contracted, and would admit matter to escape from the diseased 
part above. The vein between the two punctures, and for about four or 
five inches below where the seton had been, had sloughed away ; but 
the parts did not look very unhealthy. Below where the seton had 
been, every thing was in a natural state, and continued so to the 
' heart. For about four or five inches above the bifurcation of the 
vein each branch was plugged up at a valve, with, to all appear- 
ance, coagulable lymph, &c. either thrown out by the vessel, or, 
more probably, as it was not attached to the vein, formed by the 
coagulation of the blood in the vessel. It evidently terminated at 
a valve in each branch, and was composed of concentric layers, 
fairly plugging up the vessels. This lymph occupied only a space 
of about an inch or an inch and a half. Below that was coagulated 
dark-coloured blood for an inch or two more; and, still lower, 
an abscess was formed surrounded by a mass of putridity. The 
valves were not diseased where the obstruction terminated, and the 
lymph at these places broke off quite abruptly. 
The carotid artery was sound, and not at all affected, although 
running through a mass of disease nearly a foot in length. The 
jugular and carotid on the opposite side were in a normal state. 
The effusion of lymph and serum extended not only externally, 
but all about the larynx and tongue, and to every part internally, 
and to the inferior jaw, and in a manner which I never before saw. 
The lungs were sound. There were, perhaps, ten ounces of serum 
in the pericardium, and there was effusion of lymph and serum on 
the surface of the heart at its base, with a few spots of ecchymosis in 
the interior of it ; but, upon the whole, very little more changed than 
is usually the case in most active diseases. The kidneys, I think, 
were unusually large, each weighing four pounds, but being sound. 
This mare had been very liable to attacks of spasmodic colic of 
a most violent kind, and appearing suddenly without any assignable 
cause. She was generally relieved by a severe bleeding, and the- 
administration of an anti-spasmodic drink. It was after a bleeding 
on account of an attack of this complaint that the present case of 
VOL. XII. 5 b 
