RUPTURED STOMACH IN A MARE. 623 
and soluble from the effect of bran mashes, &c., as recommended 
to be freely given for a few days. 
Ylth, half-past 6 o’clock, A.M. —She was found by the groom 
down and rolling about in much pain, and in a state of profuse 
perspiration: she had eaten the food placed before her the previous 
evening. 
She was immediately sent back to my infirmary (a distance of 
three hundred yards), and placed in a loose box. I was from home 
at the time, but returned in about half an hour; the mare, how¬ 
ever, was dead. She had died within a few minutes after entering 
the box. 
By the symptoms I gathered from the groom, the sudden man¬ 
ner in which she had died, together with her having eaten so well 
even up to within so short a period of her death, I felt satisfied 
that a rupture had taken place either in the stomach or in some 
part of the alimentary canal. 
Post-mortem examination .—On opening the abdomen, the con¬ 
tents of the stomach were greatly scattered amongst the different 
viscera, plainly indicating a rupture of that viscus, which was found 
to exist to the extent of five or six inches on its great curvature ; 
the intestines but slightly inflamed, excepting for the space of about 
twenty inches of the single colon, in which part was closely im¬ 
pacted the largest portion of a calculus of the same character as the 
one previously described, but less in size, weighing six ounces and 
a-half, measuring in its greatest length three inches and three 
quarters, its sides possessing sharp irregular edges, from which 
portions of the triple phosphate kind had separated. It may be 
interesting to mention that this mare voided a small calculus of the 
same character as those previously described about two years since, 
its weight four ounces. The passage of this calculus was not ac¬ 
companied with symptoms of pain. She had been in the pos¬ 
session of her owner nearly six years, and had never shewn any 
symptoms of gripes. 
Remarks .—It must at once appear evident that the cause of the 
first attack arose from the passage of the calculus voided on the 
evening of the 14th; and had there not been another left behind, 
the mare, probably, would not have experienced the second attack. 
If the latter calculus had possessed as smooth and even a sur¬ 
face as the former, it would in all probability have been voided 
with less pain than that which accompanied the passage of the 
preceding one. It was the roughness of its sides, from portions 
having separated, that offered such an obstacle to its passage; and 
from the violent manner in which she fell and plunged about, the 
stomach, being probably at the time quite full, gave way. 
I remain, your’s obediently. 
