618 
REVIEW OF MOIROUd’s 
Diuretic Substances belonging to the Mineral Kingdom. 
Although all the soluble salts whose base is potash, soda, 
magnesia, or lime, have the property of exciting the secretion 
of urine, very few among them are used in veterinary medicine. 
Nitrate of Potash. —Of all diuretic medicines, the nitrate 
of potash is that which is most frequently employed in veterinary 
practice ; because it is one of the most powerful, the cheapest, 
and the most convenient to administer. It has a specific influ¬ 
ence on the kidneys, for it produces considerable increased acti¬ 
vity in these organs, without occasioning general irritation; not 
even that of the mucous membrane of the gastro-intestinal 
canal. Nevertheless, if it is employed in very large doses, as 
eight or ten ounces, on the horse, it intensely irritates the mucous 
membrane of the intestines, produces a species of super-purga¬ 
tion, and many other disorders, which may even terminate in 
death. Having been given in the veterinary school at Lyons to 
two horses in doses of eight ounces, dissolved in a pint of water, 
it destroyed them in four-and-twenty hours, with all the symptoms 
of violent intestinal inflammation: the mucous membrane was ul¬ 
cerated through its whole extent. According to M. Orfila, it de¬ 
stroys dogs in doses of two drachms: the same author thinks 
that it is not absorbed when applied to the cellular tissue ,* and 
that consequently its effects are merely local. 
Administered as a curative medicine, and with proper precau¬ 
tions, it diminishes the temperature of the body, and the force 
and frequency of the pulse ; but these effects are not to be attri¬ 
buted to any primitive and direct cooling property in the medi¬ 
cine ; they depend more on the diminution of the mass of blood, 
and the more rapid renewal of the aqueous fluids that form its 
base, and which are the necessary consequences of increased ac¬ 
tivity in the urinary secretion. 
This salt is, therefore, very useful in inflammatory complaints, 
and particularly in those which have a tendency to terminate in 
effusion, as pleurisy, peritonitis, &c. 
It is, perhaps, injurious in acute inflammations of the digestive 
canal. In order to produce its advantageous effects, it should be 
given to large animals in quantities of from one to four ounces in 
the twenty-four hours; and the use of it should be continued 
for some days, if not some weeks ; for it has been remarked, that 
it is necessary that the blood should be, in some degree, satu¬ 
rated with nitre, in order that its diuretic power should be fully 
developed. 
Carbonate of Potash. —This salt is rarely employed in¬ 
ternally ; nevertheless, administered in moderate doses, it acts in 
