16 
MEMOIRS OF A VETERINARY SURGEON. 
dency to an approaching vacuum in the compartment, con¬ 
sequent upon the heated air continually ascending and 
escaping; and as the particles of cold fresh air have spread 
themselves over the whole surface of the floor of the com¬ 
partment they become of a higher temperature, consequently 
they are lighter, and in their turn ascend. Thus it will be seen 
that a constant change of place of particles is ever occurring; 
and it is clearly our duty to give this law its fullest and 
freest possible play, for the purpose of securing and main¬ 
taining a healthy constitution, one best adapted for useful¬ 
ness and duration. My experience has convinced me that 
every stable is defective in its ventilation that has not two 
or more openings for the ingress of air at opposite points 
of the stable on the ground surface, and a ventilator at the 
top. 
Are we not, I would ask, highly culpable in imprisoning in a 
foul atmosphere that noble animal which contributes so largely 
to our wealth and our gratification, and thus causing him to 
endure suffering and disease by neglecting these considera¬ 
tions ; and this, too, when we have the instruments at our 
hands which plainly indicate to us—in a great measure at least 
—what ought to be done to remedy it ? I say there is no excuse 
for allowing this state of things to exist, especially when we 
know so well how dreadfully destructive are the causes of 
which we take so little account, and how fraught they are 
with danger to health and even to life itself; for although 
Nature is ever an economist, as Professor Spooner aptly 
observes, putting up with all kinds of shifts to carry on the 
functions of life, even where scarcely a breath of fresh air 
ever enters, and where the horse that has been gradually 
adapted to it may live on, but which would be fatal to a 
fresh, healthy horse; yet be it known that in all such places 
the work of demolition is quietly going on, a long balance 
of arrears is accumulating, and an execution is issued before 
we are aware the suit has commenced ; and from this final 
issue there is no escape, so great and so strong is the pre¬ 
disposing tendency to typhoid and putrid terminations. 
Whenever we have a patient labouring under perverted 
natural action of the lungs and air-passages, and find him 
tied up by his head in his stall, or allowed to stand in one 
position, with his nose in one corner of his loose box, inhaling 
and exhaling the same air over and over again, we may be 
sure that while he is in this situation it is next to impossible 
for him to improve. To make him breathe an atmosphere 
overcharged with carbonic acid is an equivalent to a gradual 
prevention of his breathing altogether; for we know that in 
