NORTH OF ENGLAND VETERINARY MEDICAL ASSOCIATION. 743 
rally all that is required, care being takeu to give food easily digested 
and good. In some cases where the cause in operation cannot be 
detected, I would recommend an alteration in the diet; in all cases 
where diarrhoea or constipation be present, it will be advisable to give 
a mild aperient. I prefer linseed oil before any other; aloes, I think, are 
too irritating, frequently causing colicky pains and superpurgation, 
which leaves the animal very weak, often taking months for it to regain 
its former strength. After the laxative has operated, or if the state of 
the bowels requires no opening medicine, I find alkalies alone or com¬ 
bined with vegetable tonics most beneficial, improving the appetite, 
counteracting the acidity, and strengthening the gastric apparatus. In 
some cases the alkaline treatment fails, when I have found the use of 
nitro-muriatic acid proves beneficial; I have also had good results from 
allowing the animal to eat soil, such as grass sods, or when at exercise 
allow it to help itself, which it does greedily. In foals and calves, I 
find carbonate of magnesia combined with stomachics most useful; a 
piece of chalk or rock salt placed within their reach often does good, in 
fact, they should never be without one or the other. Indigestion, when 
occurring in the winter and the hair is long, clipping frequently proves 
beneficial, restoring health in a few days after every other remedy has 
failed. In all cases, dieting, pure air, gentle exercise, and good groom¬ 
ing are to be strictly looked after, even in health. 
Impaction of the Stomach 
is caused by food too abundant in quantity or greedily swallowed 
and imperfectly masticated; this is often seen where horses are fed on 
cooked food. Deaths from this cause are very common. Some foods 
are also very dangerous for the horse, such as wheat and barley, causing 
deranged stomachs, laminitis, and death, and should not be given as an 
article of diet. I have also seen bran, when given in large quantities, 
prove fatal, causing impaction and rupture. 
Symptoms. —Flow of saliva from the mouth, nostrils dilated, anxious 
countenance, eructation of gas, occasional attempts at vomition, fulness 
of the abdomen, colicky pains, pawing with the fore feet, keeps the head 
pressed into a corner, or if a stall 'under the manger, partial sweats, 
afraid to lie down, and when down lies but a short time. In the latter 
stages we have the peculiar catching breathing, discharge from the 
nostrils of the medicines we have attempted to give, walking round the 
box until the last, when everything seems to give way, and the animal 
falls, to rise no more, from ruptured stomach. 
Treatment is in most cases not very successful, as we are seldom called 
in during the earlier stages. I have had most success with linseed oil, 
ammonia, or turpentine, and enemas, care being taken not to allow the 
animal to lie down suddenly. I have also had good results from a little 
gentle exercise, and if much pain was present gave the tincture or 
extract of belladonna by itself, or combined with opium. 
I shall consider the next two diseases together, as they are closely 
allied, viz.: 
Constipation and Obstruction. 
Generally affect the large intestines, and may be looked upon more as 
a symptom of, rather than a disease, and result from debility or para¬ 
lysis of some portion of the intestines. Animals over-abundantly fed, or 
kept upon food containing too much woody fibre, are more liable to 
suffer; in some cases the bowels are naturally torpid. 
Symptoms —When arising from paralysis, one diagnostic symptom is 
absence of intestinal murmurs, and, if affecting the large intestines, a 
