453 
OR DROPPING AFTER CALVING. 
free use of the lancet. These complaints have a peculiar ten¬ 
dency in cattle to run their course with a rapidity which the 
human practitioner would scarcely think possible. A copious 
bleeding at the outset of the disease may arrest it at once ; but a 
small bleeding, even in the early stage, and most assuredly when 
the case is advanced, will be worse than inefficient; for it will in¬ 
crease the natural tendency of the malady to take on a low and 
fatal form. If the salts should not act in six hours, eight ounces 
more should be given, and that dose repeated every six hours until 
the animal is freely purged. 
Sedative medicines should next be exhibited, as digitalis, 
emetic tartar, and nitre, in the proportions of a drachm of each 
of the two first, and half an ounce of the last, and repeated two 
or three times every day. 
In the majority of cases, this first and all-important period will 
have passed away, and the veterinary surgeon will be called in 
to witness the fatal winding up of the case, and perhaps to be 
censured for his want of skill in not being able to accomplish 
impossibilities. 
The cow will now begin to swell: the power of digestion 
seems first to fail, and the paunch and intestines are inflated 
by foetid gas. Let not the practitioner confound this with hoove, 
or dilation of the paunch alone, and think that by the introduc¬ 
tion of the probang, or by puncturing at the flank, he can give 
permanent or even considerable relief. I should not object to 
the use of either of these means to relieve the distention in a 
slight degree, but to a slight degree only can it be relieved. The 
colon and the caecum, and even the small intestines, share in the 
distension, and occupy the greater part of it. My friend, Mr. 
King, of Stanmore, whose practice on cattle is of longer 
standing and more extensive than mine, says, (Veterinarian, 
vol. ii, p. 394) that “the extrication of air is sometimes so great 
as to tear the stomachs from their adhesion to the diaphragm, 
and rupture that muscle.” I think I could shew him that this 
is anatomically impossible; and I should refer the rupture of the 
diaphragm to the struggles of the animal before she is “ down 
for good.” 
The cow will now stagger; the weakness will be principally in 
the hindquarters; and will rapidly increase; she will fall; get 
up; again fall, and at length remain unable to rise, her head 
bent back towards her side, and all her limbs palsied. And now, 
when in the great majority of cases no good can be done, the 
proprietor begins to be alarmed, and requires our assistance. 
The duration of this second stage of the disease is more pro¬ 
tracted than the first, but uncertain : 1 have known it endure 
3 p 
VOL. III. 
