596 
R. W. BURKE. 
pointed out that season exercised a great influence on the 
occurrence of pernicious anaemia also in the human subject. 
(k) Post-Mortem Appearances.— Dr. Evans, our first 
authority on surra, writes: “ I am prepared to state positive¬ 
ly that this disease is not characterized by any structural 
organic change ; it is purely a disease of the blood.” Prin¬ 
cipal Veterinary Surgeon Oliphant says: “ In one outbreak 
of surra in the 18th Bengal Cavalry, in which one hundred 
and eighty horses died, I made dozens of post-mortem exam¬ 
inations, and the appearances in all were identical; extreme 
pallidity of the tissues, with perhaps a trifling serous effusion 
into the abdomen, etc. In fact, the animals looked as if they 
had been starved to death.” Veterinary surgeon Cooper 
says, “ that the most striking feature is the anaemic condition 
of the tissues generally and the absence of recognizable le¬ 
sion.” And Zschokke* also states “that none of the princi¬ 
pal organs show any marked structural change ” in the 
equine type of pernicious anaemia noticed in Germany. 
Mr. Steel lays stress on the presence of gastric ulcers, 
which he believes to be “ characteristic of surraand the 
relation of gastric ulceration to pernicious anaemia formed 
the subject of discussion lately at the Royal Academy of 
Medicine of Ireland. ( Lancet , March io, 1888, page 474.) 
The pathological changes that take place in the various 
organs and tisssues of the body as a result of surra may be 
characterised, in a word, as degeneration due to imperfect 
nourishment. The blood itself is rendered unfitted for the 
purposes of proper nutrition, and degenrative changes of an 
adipose character, sometimes leading to disintegration of por¬ 
tions of the imperfectly nourished tissue, take place. When 
organs and parts so weakened by starvation are distended 
with anaemic blood which they cannot utilise, sloughs result 
from' gangrene of the imperfectly nourished tissues, as evi¬ 
denced in the ulcerations of the stomach, etc., noted in this 
disease. The ulcer itself once formed, suffers from nutri¬ 
tional defect, owing to the impoverished state of the blood, 
* Schweizer Archiv. fur Thierheilkunde , Bd. 25, 1883. 
