MEMOIRS OF A VETERINARY SURGEON. 
257 
a large horsecloth or thick grey rugging, one and a half yard 
wide, by five yards long. I immerse the whole of it in hot 
water, wring it out well, and then w r rap it completely round 
the thorax and abdomen, and pinning it moderately tight, 
cover the Yvhole with dry cloths, and allow it to remain on 
for two or three hours, and then renew it. 
Hydrothorax. 
We must presume the disease is still resolutely holding on 
its obdurate course, while day after day “ hope still tells its 
flattering tale the close observer, however, cannot shut his 
eyes to the fact, that the difficulties are becoming greater 
and greater; but even yet our labours may be crowned with 
success, for nature when well seconded, and not having been 
sapped by artificial means, may make an effort, and our 
patient may yet recover. But let us trace the dark outlines . 
of this case a little further. Day after day, by dint of great 
care and good nursing, the patient is sustained; but in the 
face of your tonics, belladonna, preparations of iron, hydrio- 
date of potass, iodine, and everything else you can think of, 
the conviction will force itself upon your mind that the water 
gains, and the ship is gradually sinking. In this stage I 
have often been surprised at the difference there is in the 
symptoms in different cases. One will breathe compara¬ 
tively tranquil even in the last stage, whilst another breathes 
in such a manner as to show the greatest possible distress. 
Again, some eat astonishingly well all through, whilst others 
loathe all food most obstinately from the first. To this latter 
may be attributed the fact that one lives much longer than 
the other; the one dies in about fourteen days, whilst another 
lives three or four weeks, and in some cases rallies after all. 
I have also observed where the pleura is chiefly affected, and 
effusion going on, that the horse maintains an obstinacy to 
stand—he will stand until he fall and expires; but where the 
pleura is not so much affected, but the bronchia and lung 
tissue is becoming disorganized and mortified, he will lie 
down for a short time at once, especially in the last stage. 
Percussion and auscultation are only correctly acquired by 
very careful and close observation, and even then the sounds 
are so variable that I have known our best practitioners to 
be wholly perplexed and at fault; and the operation of para¬ 
centesis thoracis must at all times be left to the intelligence 
of the practitioner; but all the while we behold our suffering 
