426 
LEE HOOVER. 
production >f the disease, as the strong no less than the weak 
animals are attacked, and are just as liable to succumb, and 
it appears when every kind of diet is given to the dam. He 
also denies that it is produced by chills, but attributes its oc¬ 
currence to pycemic or septic infection. A great amount of 
care is betowed on the newly-born infant, and scrupulous at¬ 
tention is paid to the severing and bandaging of the umbilical 
cord immediately after birth ; while the foal has to lie with 
an open wound in all kinds of filth, and is thus exposed in the 
readiest manner to inoculation with poisonous or injurious mat¬ 
ter, which cannot always be excluded even from .stables built 
expressly for breeding purposes, and kept scrupulously clean. 
If the navel wound of the infant were exposed to the filth 
which young foals have to lie in, it would be quite as liable to 
contract blood poisoning as are our four-footed animals; and 
just so long as breeders ignore the prophylactic treatment of 
this disease, just so long will their annual losses be greater 
from the ravages of this disease. The prognosis is very un¬ 
favorable. There is a greater fatality among foals from the 
effects of omphalo-phlebitis than from all other diseases. 
Often on a foal otherwise recovering from an attack of this 
disease, we find an anchylosis of one or more joints, necessita¬ 
ting the destruction of an otherwise valuable animal. 
It is not essentially due to a specific bacteria, but mav be 
and often is caused by the products of decomposition of nitro¬ 
genous matter, without the presence of living micro-organisms. 
The umbilicus being raw, and but lately the entrance of 
the life-giving substance into the body, absorbs the septic 
poisoning directly into the system, and after three to ten 
days the colt will be found to be very lame in one or more 
limbs, usually only one hind limb being affected at first, this 
usually being the only premonitory symptom, the owner de¬ 
claring that nothing ailed the colt except that the mare had 
stepped on one of its legs. 
Around the epiphysis of the bones, and consequently near 
the articulation, there is swelling not only of the proper tis¬ 
sue of the joint, but also of the surrounding connective tissue, 
With hot cedematous infiltration of the region, causing intense 
