V. SURGICAL DISEASES OE THE STOMACH 
AND BOWELS. 
I.—FOREIGN BODIES IN THE DIGESTIVE TRACT. 
Sharp substances, like needles, wire, nails, &c., accidentally present in 
the food are sometimes swallowed by oxen, less often by sheep and goats, 
and give rise to injuries both of the digestive tube and of other parts, 
like the pericardium and heart. Horses are not so often affected, though 
in one case a quantity of nails, buttons, and screws were found in the 
colon of a horse, their abraded condition showing they had already lain 
there for a long time. 
Hogs often swallow stones, corks, balls, or coins which they have picked 
up or had given them to carry ; whilst in the stomachs of oxen and horses 
portions of probangs or balling-guns are sometimes found. 
Hahn, while making a post-mortem of a horse, found an abscess in the spleen, 
containing a piece of wood 13 inches in length and \ an inch in thickness. 
In one case a pig swallowed a castrating knife 4 inches in length, which 
remained lying in the stomach for two months without producing any marked 
disturbance. A similar experience in the dog is related by Iwersen. A sport¬ 
ing dog swallowed a pocket-knife while carrying it to its master, but vomited 
it again nineteen days later. Seven stones, of a collective weight of 5^ ounces, 
were found in the stomach of a Newfoundland dog. The organ was greatly 
distended, its mucous membrane thickened and covered with warty growths. 
The dog had been accustomed to play with stones, tossing them into the air 
and again catching them, and this had at length proved fatal, a piece of coal 
having blocked the ileo-csecal valve and occluded the bowel. A cat swallowed 
a glass-headed hair-pin, 4| inches long. The head had entered the stomach, 
but the sharp end remained in the oesophagus, and led to perforation and 
death. 
The danger thus occasioned is of a double nature : sharp foreign bodies, 
like needles, nails, &c., perforate the wall of the stomach or bowel, and 
lead to fatal peritonitis, or they penetrate the diaphragm and pro¬ 
duce septic pericarditis. This is the rule in cattle, where such bodies 
enter from the reticulum. It often happens that, at the point of injury, 
he stomach or bowel becomes adherent to the abdominal wall, leading to 
perforation outwardly and escape of the foreign body. The discharge of 
needles, hair-pins, and portions of wire has often been observed in cattle, 
and usually occurs on the left side, close behind the elbow. Avril removed 
