570 
W. L. WILLIAMS. 
into typical cases of parturient apoplexy, while others ran a 
mild course, without coma, to a favorable termination. In 
fact, the parturient eclampsia of cows, as described by 
Fleming, passes by insensible gradations into parturient apo¬ 
plexy, so that so far as we can determine by clinical observa¬ 
tion, the non-febrile, post-parturient convulsive and comatose 
affections of the various lower animals belong in one group 
and are dependent upon one cause. 
That these affections in different species, or in animals of a 
different temperament or under different conditions in the 
same species, should present variations in symptoms in the 
relative nervous irritability or coma, is perfectly natural. 
We note a close correspondence in the character of the 
patients affected by parturient convulsions, all being those of 
apparent vigorous constitution, and in those occurring after 
parturition the labor has been easy. 
The symptoms we have enumerated as occurring in the 
mare bear a close resemblance to the eclampsia of other lower 
animals, and of woman, as well as to the early stages of par¬ 
turient apoplexy of the cow. 
Like eclampsia in the other lower animals, and in woman, 
the disease in the mare is ushered in suddenly, runs a rapid 
course of twenty-four to forty-eight hours, and terminates as 
abruptly as it began, rarely in partial, usually in complete re¬ 
covery, or in death. 
The diagnosis should apparently be quite easy in all cases. 
The history of the case so far as observed seems of special 
value. The clonic and tonic spasms, the extreme trismus and 
the peculiar spasm of the diaphragm, are quite characteristic. 
It may be confounded with: 
(a). Tetanus, from which it is distinguished by the sudden 
onset, the earlier and more complete trismus, the greater 
nervous irritability and greater tendency to clonic spasms, 
the greater tendency to lie down, the dilatation of the pupil 
and pouiretting of the eyes, the much less marked protrusion 
of the membrana nictitans over the eyeball, the absence of 
any antecedent wound, the far more rapid course and usually 
more favorable termination. 
