IIE-ABSORPTION OF PUS IN STRANGLP:S. 
643 
the left side there was considerable enlargement. Mr. Hayes 
suspects that there might have been pus here. There no doubt 
was, for this collection is occasionally found in parts in which 
no trace of irritation or injury can possibly be discovered. The 
molecules of the pus are found lodged between those of the 
healthy part, and there is no appreciable disease in any of 
the surrounding solids. There was nothing extraordinary in 
the parotid glands becoming the depositories of this pus : 
they were in the neighbourhood of the original abscess—they 
probably shared in the inflammation ; but the loins, for aught 
that appears to the contrary, had never been previously diseased. 
Mr. Hayes recalls our attention to a case of rupture of the 
stomach, recorded by him at page 615 of the last volume of 
The Veterinarian. He finds the stomach of a horse 
‘‘ almost decomposed and ruptured in many directions—he 
could not recognize more than one-half of its natural propor¬ 
tions or substance, and yet the horse ate well two hours before 
death.”—This appears to him somewhat marvellous. 
To a certain, but we own, a very inadequate, extent, we 
may be able to explain this: — In almost every case of rupture 
of the stomach that has fallen under our observation, the ex¬ 
tent of laceration in the three coats of the stomach has been 
very different, and the appearances, after death, led to the sus¬ 
picion that they did not always take place at the same time. 
In the peritoneal coat the laceration is much more extensive 
than in either of the others; and, if we may judge from its 
unhealthy and altered colour, it had taken place at some con¬ 
siderable period before that of either of the other coats. In 
cases of ruptured stomach we have more than once traced a 
plain and palpable rupture of the peritoneal coat, in certain 
jrarts when there has been only a disgregation of some of the 
fibres of the muscular coat, and the mucous membrane has 
been whole and sound. 
The appearance of the rupture of the muscular coat is very 
different from that of the peritoneal. It is no clean and straight 
laceration; but the fibres have been disgregated and ruptured 
on either side of, and higher or low'cr on the principal chasm, 
and would very much rescml)le the hung-like rags” which 
Mr. Hayes describes. The edges of this laceration will very 
soon present a sodden or half-putrified appearance. The ex¬ 
tent of the opening through this coat, in the majority of in¬ 
stances, will not be one-half of that in the peritoneal coat. 
Suj)posing the stomach to have given way in two or three 
places, the extremely irregular edges of the muscular coat will 
not have been very unaptly described by Mr. Hayes. 
