157 
Quid sit pulchruin, quid turpe, quid utile, quid non.—liou. 
On the hifliience of Physical Agents on Life, by \V. F. 
Edwards, M.15. F.R.S., 8cc. CrainSlatctJ fiom tijc dTrmrlji 
by Dr. Hodgkin and Dr. Fisher. To ichich are added, in 
the Appendix, Some Observations on Electricity, 
by Dr. Edwards, M. Fouillet, and Luke Howard, F.R.S.; 
On Absorption and the Uses of the Spleen, by Dr. 
Hodgkin; On the Microscopic Characters of the Hni^ 
MAL Tissues and Fluids, by J. J. Lister, F.ll.S., and Dr. 
Hodgkin ; and Some jNTotes to the Works of Dr. Ed¬ 
wards. London: S. Highley, 1SS2. 
There is something in the title of this work, and the subjects 
it professes to discuss, exceedingly interesting to the veterinary 
student. Our patients, far more than those of the human prac¬ 
titioner, are exposed to “ the influence of physical agents.” 
Neither luxury nor fashion have caused much serious deviation 
from the mode of food which nature had prescribed; and the 
pharmacopeia of the veterinary surgeon is necessarily limited, by 
the inertness, in the quadruped, of many a medicine valuable in 
human practice : while the physical agents are left either to exert 
their natural influence, whether salutary or injurious, or, too 
often, their beneficial effect is counteracted by our absurd preju¬ 
dices, and they are changed from ministers of health to the insi¬ 
dious or manifest sources of disease. There can be no subject 
more interesting to us than the effect of heat, and cold, and 
light, and atmospheric air, and moisture, and other mysterious 
substances or principles on our quadruped patients. 
One half of the diseases of the horse and of cattle are referri- 
ble to temperature—many more to the changes effected in the 
atmospheric air by respiration, perspiration, and the various ex¬ 
cretions—and the greater part of the residue must be traced to 
some unknown and not sufiiciently appreciated atmospheric 
agency. The epidemics which used to thin the numbers of our 
quadruped servants, and which are still continually appearing, 
but under a milder form—the very character of many diseases, 
and their changing forms, at different times and seasons, have 
the self-same origin; nay, there is not a single disease which, in 
its type, intensity, and fatality, does not acknowledge the same 
unexplained, incomprehensible power. We have determined to de¬ 
vote many a page of our work to the consideration of this im¬ 
portant but neglected subject. It may be of advantage to see 
