639 
ON SOME OF THE DISEASES OF THE STOMACH 
AND INTESTINES OF THE HORSE AND 
OTHER ANIMALS. 
By Professor Brown, M.R.C.V.S., 
Royal Agricultural College, Cirencester. 
(Continued from p. 327.) 
Diarrhoea. 
Notwithstanding the various forms under which this 
disease is seen, it consists essentially in the same condition 
of the intestinal canal. Various causes may be concerned in 
the production of this state, but in every instance, as a matter 
of necessity, there must be an increase in the fluid secretion 
from the lining membrane. Excess of fluid not only occa¬ 
sions a softening of the contents of the tube, but it also 
excites contraction by its mechanical action; and this ex¬ 
plains the excessive evacuation which is the characteristic 
symptom of the disease. 
The importance to be attached to diarrhoea will depend 
upon various circumstances; for example, the condition of 
the animal attacked, the extent of the morbid action, the 
causes in operation to produce it, and its complication with 
other diseases. 
Some animals, as cattle and sheep, seem to suffer but 
little from diarrhoea, which does not continue for any length 
of time, while horses are seldom afflicted without serious 
sympathetic derangement. In these latter the disease is not 
one of common occurrence, and is always looked upon with 
some alarm unless it can be at once traced to something in 
the animafs diet. 
Horses appear to be subject occasionally to a peculiar kind 
of diarrhoea, which may be termed acute ; sudden in its occur¬ 
rence, accompanied by a quick pulse, injection and heat of 
the membrane of the mouth, and sometimes by very violent 
abdominal pain ; the evacuations are constant, liquid, and 
excessive in quantity; as a matter of course, the appetite is 
lost and the thirst extreme. Although generally and rapidly 
fatal, the malady will sometimes yield to sedatives given in gum 
or linseed emulsion, with counter-irritation to the abdomen. 
Another form of diarrhoea in horses we have seen to arise 
from want of care subsequent to the administration of 
