196 
DISEASES OF THE STOMACH AND INTESTINES. 
more serious matter. Cattle, sheep, horses, and pigs, are the 
sufferers—probably sheep to the greatest extent. The 
disease is commonly termed (i grain sick,” te clover sick,” and 
(( stomach staggers.” 
In every instance it may be traced to an excessive con¬ 
sumption of food. Among horses we have known it often to 
arise from a greedily swallowed meal of coarse and bulky 
food, after a long fast. In cattle, a large quantity of roots or 
green food, particularly when they contain an excess of 
moisture from absorption of the wet to which they may have 
been exposed, will produce distension. Sheep turned into a 
field of clover of luxuriant growth, will, if they have been 
jireviously kept from succulent diet, eat so rapidly and freely 
as to cause fatal distension in an hour or two. Not long 
since a number of sheep were so treated, and in about two 
hours several w T ere found lying dead, and many, indeed 
nearly all, much distressed, several of them dying in the 
course of the day. 
The condition of the stomach is manifested by symptoms 
that are generally very characteristic. 
Horses are usually dull and heavy in appearance, some¬ 
times to the extent of absolute coma. When the distension 
is not extreme, and the brain is yet scarcely affected, there 
are indications of abdominal pain, in association with the 
peculiar symptom of turning up the top lip. Not that this 
can be considered diagnostic, as it is often seen under other 
circumstances. 
Cattle and sheep suffer most from the pressure of the 
distended rumen upon the diaphragm. They are always 
much distressed, making frequent attempts at eructation ; the 
saliva is discharged from the mouth in increased quantities, 
and the swollen sides testify, by their yielding and pitting 
upon pressure, to the nature of the contents of the viscus, 
and prove that the disturbance is not due to the extrication 
of gas only, although inevitably, in every case, tympanitis is 
a concomitant. 
In the horse, the disease, if fatal, terminates in death by 
coma, or by rupture of the stomach. 
In cattle and sheep the death of the patient can always be 
safely referred to asphyxia. Rupture of the rumen from dis¬ 
tension is nearly impossible, as the respiration would cease 
from mechanical interference with the movements of the 
thorax before the rumen had reached the limits of its ex¬ 
pansive capabilities. 
The treatment is not usually satisfactory in its results. 
The paramount object is to remove the mass by increasing 
