CASHS OF PALSY IN THE HORSE. 281 ; 
On reconsidering these two cases, it appears that these animals 
died in less than twenty-four hours; that the disease was palsy 
of the hind limbs; and that on examination after death, the spinal 
marrow did not present those serious alterations which we aie 
accustomed to meet with under similar circumstances, that in 
the first nothing was observed but a yellowness, softening and 
thickening of the nerves of the lumbar region, and in the second, 
considerable injection of the arachnoid membiane of the same 
region. 
If it is asked how alterations so slight in appearance could 
produce affections so serious, and so speedily terminating in death, 
I reply, that I am utterly unable to account for it; but I add 
that, notwithstanding the valuable labours of Gall, Spurzheim, 
Bell, Magendie, and Fleurens, and many other physiologists, 
our notions of the organization and functions of the spinal cord 
are sadly incomplete, and therefore it is not surpnsing that oui 
knowledge of the maladies to wdiich it is subject, and the 
lesions of which it is the occasional seat, should also be im¬ 
perfect. 
To the above interesting cases, recorded by M. Bouley,M. Re- • 
nault (one of the editors of the “ Recueil”) has added two others, 
selected from the records of the school at Alfort. The first is 
analogous to the second in JVI. Bouley’s memoir; the other pos¬ 
sesses considerable novelty with regard to the exceedingly slight 
alteration that had taken place in the spinal chord. 
CASE I. 
A large mare, six years old, of good constitution, and that had 
been accustomed to draw in the diligence, was suddenly seized 
with lameness in one of her hind legs, as she was at work on 
July the 9th, 1832. The farrier who attended her, not perceiv¬ 
ing any ostensible cause of lameness, ordered rest. She did rest 
until the 14th, when the lameness not appearing to be very se¬ 
vere, she was harnessed to a cabriolet, that was to convey one 
passenger only from Charenton to Paris. She did her work with¬ 
out apparent inconvenience, until she arrived at Charenton Street, 
in Paris, when she all at once lost the use of her hind limbs, and 
fell between the shafts without making the slightest effort to rise 
again. After having unharnessed her, several persons in vain at¬ 
tempted to put her upon her legs ; her hind limbs hanging loose, 
and floating as it were, afforded not the slightest support when 
she was held up, and she was placed on a bed of stravv that was 
prepared for her at the side of the street. A farrier in the 
