146 STRANGULATED INTESTINE AND RUPTURE OF STOMACH. 
I have the greatest reliance as a practical man, promptly 
attended. He found the horse evincing symptoms only of a 
slight attack of common colic, or spasms of the bowels, and 
he accordingly administered, at proper intervals, the usual 
antispasmodic draught until three were given, frequently 
threw up an enema, and applied friction to the abdomen. 
No relief being afforded by these efforts to alleviate the pain 
of the poor animal, he very properly came to my house, 
called me up, and stated the case to me. I immediately 
went and saw the patient, which I did not find so very im¬ 
patient as some horses I have attended labouring under colic. 
His pulse was only slightly affected, but the body was in a 
profuse sw’eat under his clothes, he \vas frequently getting 
up and lying down, although he would appear easy for a 
considerable length of time when resting his abdomen upon 
the straw bed, and he frequently looked round to the off side. 
I administered an enema of warm water, but it came back 
perfectly clear, and was followed by straining, or an effort to 
expel or void some faeces: always a bad sign. A sinapism 
was freely applied to the abdomen in a somewhat severe man¬ 
ner, but little or no sensation was evinced, even when it was 
applied with a considerable amount of friction, and subse¬ 
quently a thick coating of it was left upon the skin. The 
jugular vein was freely opened with a broad-shouldered 
fleam, but we had great difficulty in getting two quarts of 
blood to flow into a pail, with the usual auxiliary of forcing 
him to simulate mastication. 
My diagnosis was inflammation of the stomach, or some 
part of the small intestines. 
I have always found horses with acute attacks of the organs 
I have just mentioned, lie quiet for a time, leading one to 
hope favorably, and I have also noticed that they are never 
so violent as when the large intestines are the seat of the 
malady. 
When I received my summons to attend the horse, and 
saw him, I was fully aware that prompt and decisive measures 
■would have to be employed, yet great caution would have to 
be exercised in an animal that had just got over a dose of 
physic, therefore I ordered a ball containing ingredients of a 
gently laxative and anodyne nature, this to be repeated every 
hour until relief was afforded, or I directed its discontinuance 
and the substitution of some other medicine. The horse was 
scarcely ever left during the night of his attack or the subse¬ 
quent day ; but about eighteen hours from the first I discon¬ 
tinued giving any medicine, and pronounced it to be a hope¬ 
less case. In six hours afterwards he was dead. 
