794 
LIVERPOOL VETERINARY MEDICAL ASSOCIATION. 
siclerably diminished. In this stage light also should be gradually ad¬ 
mitted, Alterative medicine should be administered, such as one drachm 
aloes to three Nit. Potass, daily, or any other medicines of the class in 
your dally use. The diet to consist of green meat, if in season, or raw- 
potatoes, &c., with bran, and a little hay. 
Should any appearance of nebula, albugo, or leucoma remain, the 
pathology of which I have given, treat with cold water and applications 
of nitrate of silver daily, and an absorbent blister round the eye. 
In the human subject we have mentioned of the conjunctiva, or sequels 
of ophthalmia which we are seldom called to treat, one of which I will 
simply call your attention to, as somewhat similar cases may be met with 
occasionally, but from a different cause, in dogs by scratches in the eyes 
by cats. The disease I speak of is purulent ophthalmia, or suppurative 
inflammation of the conjunctiva, and you will recognise that from one 
point of the symptoms of the latter, viz. the commencement of the cornea 
to slough, the symptoms are analogous, and require much the same 
treatment. 
The symptoms which precede the discharge of pus are similar to those 
in the acute stage of simple ophthalmia; it is therefore useless to repeat 
them, the eye becomes dry, and the first symptom is a gradual exudation 
of mucus from the surface of the cornea, which speedily changes to pus; 
sloughing now takes place, and lamella after lamella comes away, or 
almost the whole of the cornea sloughs off at once; in the latter case, 
the eye is totally destroyed as the iris becomes protruded; aqueous, 
vitreous humour, and the crystalline lens, escape. If the opening is 
small, funnel-shaped, or piped, the aqueous humour escapes only, the 
iris becomes prolapsed into the opening, and although the appearance of 
the eye is altered, the vision in a degree is retained. 
Before sloughing has commenced violent antiphlogistics with hot 
poultices to the eyes are used, afterwards tonics, stimulants, and 
astringents, and great cleanliness to the parts affected, is the best treat¬ 
ment recommended for this fearful disease. Oak bark being highly 
spoken of. Mercurial ointment, with a little creosote mixed, is very 
highly recommended in chronic albugo, purulent and scrofulous ophthal¬ 
mia, in the ulcerated stage, but attention is more particularly directed to 
the action of the creosote. 
Acute, specific, or periodic ophthalmia are the various names given to 
what may, and has justly been called, the “bane of good horse flesh,” 
and what is known to farriers and grooms as moon-blindness. I will not 
dwell further on the appellations and their sources, for they are many, 
but proceed with the subject at once. 
The symptoms in this case are at first with difficulty recognised, and 
come on very gradually, contrary to those of pimple; you may see the 
first recognisable symptom, which is a slight overflow of tears first thing 
in the morning. On closer examination, you will find the blood-vessels 
on the sclerotic coat much congested, and forming quite a zone of vessels 
surrounding the outer part of the cornea; the globe dull and sunk; the 
iris changed in colour, having a very red appearance from being con¬ 
gested with red blood, being also swelled and puckered. These symp¬ 
toms become modified, and a large body or bodies which consist of exu¬ 
dations of lymph may be seen floating about in the anterior chamber, 
and some of which become attached to and resemble yellow tubercles on 
the iris, or, rather, yellowish white ; the aqueous humour becomes turbid, 
the conjunctiva partaking also of the inflammation, the eye, of course, 
being unable to bear light. Added to this we have always at this time 
great constitutional derangement. Animal oflf his feed ; pulse quick and 
