ON THERAPEUTICS. 
191 
rienced in producing the effect required, while the excite¬ 
ment, so far from being an objection, is in many cases most) 
beneficial; for instance, during a tendency to dropsical 
effusion and in the depression which usually supervenes 
upon acute disease. 
The intensity of the action will be regulated by the nature 
of the malady. In subacute inflammations of mucous mem¬ 
branes, in catarrh, both laryngeal and bronchial, in spasm 
and acute diarrhoea, mustard, with ammonia or vinegar, acts 
immediately, and produces only a temporary excitement. In 
chronic mucous inflammation, attended with much secretion, 
setons are most efficacious, particularly if the animal be 
in plethoric condition. 
In inflammation of the subacute form, effecting serous 
membranes, attended as it invariably is w r ith effusion, and in 
all instances where the system suffers from debility after 
acute disease has subsided, vesicants take the precedence of 
the other agents. Acting quickly and energetically, they 
seem to produce an almost tonic as well as derivative effect, 
at no cost to the animal beyond a small loss of serum, of 
which there is, in such cases, usually an excess. 
Under the empirical system of the old school, the tor¬ 
ture of the “rowell” and blister was inflicted upon every 
unfortunate animal suffering already the pangs of an acute 
pneumonia; the practitioner of a more enlightened age, with 
his drops of aconite and grains of calomel, quietly unseats a 
disease which refuses to be expelled by seemingly more 
potent agencies. Nevertheless, he does not scruple to em¬ 
ploy those agencies when they are indicated. 
As remedies for defects of joints, ligaments, and ten¬ 
dons, and for the majority of osseous diseases, counter- 
irritants of the most potent kind are apparently indispen¬ 
sable. In spite of the outcry on the score of humanity, no 
effectual substitute is suggested. The seton may be advo¬ 
cated to the exclusion of the cautery, or the blister to the 
exclusion of both; but counter-irritation in some severe 
shape is admitted to be indispensable in many cases. 
In veterinary practice it is much to be feared that the 
desperate diseases to which working animals are liable—the 
££ spavins 99 and e£ sprained tendons”—will ever require despe¬ 
rate remedies. The abolition of the actual cauterv is not, 
therefore, a possibility of our future, unless owners of animals 
will be content with a partial cure, and not insist, as they 
now do, that absolute and permanent soundness shall be the 
average result of veterinary treatment of cases which in 
human surgery would condemn a patient to a life upon 
