THE USE OF bp:lladonna in tetanus. 
567 
jaws with tolerable freedom. It was not, however, until several 
days after this that she could stoop sufficiently to graze in the 
pasture. 
Her medicine, as well as her food, I gave by means of a blad¬ 
der attached to a human enema tube. I attribute the successful 
termination of the case to the use of the extract of belladonna ; 
for, soon after the first dose was administered, she began to be 
composed, and gradually improved. She was evidently under 
the influence of the belladonna, for the pupil was very much 
dilated. When I began to feel that she was safe, I lessened the 
dose of the narcotic, and to-day have ordered it to be left off. 
Do you attribute the tetanic attack to the injury of the hock, 
or to the docking? This is, to me, a rather interesting inquiry. 
[This is another welcome testimony to the efficacy of belladonna 
in tetanus. It has not been administered with unvaried suc¬ 
cess by any one, and in no age of after-improvement will that 
medicine or mode of treatment be discovered to which this 
fearful disease will always yield. With regard to the prin¬ 
ciple of our treatment there cannot be a moment’s doubt ,—we 
must tranquillize the system. We may, to a certain degree, 
effect this by early and copious bleeding: we have a valuable, 
an indispensable auxiliary in purgatives; but we look to the 
list of sedative medicines for our most powerful weapon. There 
are very few of us who have not experienced the beneficial 
effect of opium, and many a horse has been rescued from de¬ 
struction by it; but it does not exert its full influence on 
some, and its power becomes diminished by the continued use 
of it in others. We want another drug, of similar and of equal 
power, that we may alternate with it, or mingle with it, or use 
instead of it. Some practitioners think that they have this in 
belladonna. We give no definite opinion at present; but cer¬ 
tain it is that it has been eminently successful in some cases 
that have been lately recorded in The Veterinarian, and 
that it here did all that Mr. Hutchinson could have wished. 
As to the question which Mr. Hutchinson asks, whether the 
injury of the hock or the docking was the cause of this tetanic 
attack, we really are unable to give any satisfactory answer. 
A serious injury of the hock might have laid the foundation 
for tetanus, but we have never known such a case. We have 
known many a case of tetanus following docking, and there¬ 
fore we should look to this as the more jirobable cause. It is 
possible, however, that both may have been concerned.—Y.] 
