146 
ON FARCY. 
fancy or the sagest counsel had advised having failed, we knew 
not what to do. Emollients, tonic bitters, the application of the 
cautery, the use of the blister, all, far from being serviceable, 
seemed to aggravate the evil. At length there remained nothing 
to be tried but the ointment of the sulphuret of potash. Several 
horses were put under treatment with it. The affected parts 
were well rubbed with it many times in the course of twenty-four 
hours. After some days the success was complete—they were 
cured. We attributed the fortunate result to chance—to nature; 
nevertheless we repeated the experiment, and upon a greater 
number of horses, and the success was the same : we continued 
it, and we found that farcy was a curable disease, at least, if at¬ 
tacked before it had become inveterate—constitutional. 
We observed, that when the ointment of the sulphuret of pot¬ 
ash had been continued during a considerable time, the skin be¬ 
came red and sore : we then employed cataplasms, or decoctions 
of belladonna, until the irritation had disappeared. We dimi¬ 
nished the quantity of food, and gave white drinks, or chaff only. 
Ordinarily, however, the patients were left to their usual regimen. 
When the buttons were hard, frictions with mercurial ointment 
softened them. A very light application of the actual cautery 
favoured the cicatrization of yellow and sanious ulcers which were 
occasionally found about the eyes, on the forehead, the nostrils, 
or the limbs. The severe application of the iron was always in¬ 
jurious rather than useful. 
We were obliged to continue this mode of treatment for a long 
time if farcy attacked the limbs; but generally we succeeded. 
The frictions with the ointment of the sulphuret of potash were 
singularly successful in promoting the healing of farcy ulcers, 
and the resolution of farcy swellings. 
Conclusions. 
If we compare what has been said of leprosy in the human 
being and farcy in the horse, we cannot fail of recognizing a per¬ 
fect identity between them; with a few modifications only, result¬ 
ing from difference of organization. We cannot assign the 
precise period when leprosy was imported into Europe, and to 
this day an impenetrable obscurity veils the origin of farcy. 
There is nothing in human or veterinary medicine that can dis¬ 
pel the darkness. Their identity is demonstrated by lesions 
which are found both in men and in the horse from the com¬ 
mencement to the close^of the disease. There are the same pre¬ 
monitory symptoms—the same progress—the same buttons—the 
same ulcers—and on the same parts of the body. We have not, 
however, seen in the human being the subcutaneous purulent 
