112 INFLUENZA AS AFFECTING THE HORSES OF AMERICA. 
acid, and allowed gentle exercise when the weather would 
permit. 
In the pneumonic variety I blistered and setoned the 
chest, gave little or no hay, sponged the nostrils frequently 
with soap and water, allowed plenty of litter, although the 
patient very seldom laid down. Many of the patients would 
take little else but cold water. 
When the fever subsided I commenced the use of tonics, 
ginger, gentian, and sulph. iron, either in ball or powder. 
Several cases required little or no treatment, good nursing 
being all that was necessary. 
It attacked horses and mules of all classes and ages, neither 
locality nor cleanliness making any difference. Many hun¬ 
dreds died throughout the country from the improper use of 
belladonna, aconite, purgatives, low diet, bad ventilation, and 
want of ordinary and proper attention. 
Scores of animals were put to work when the nervous 
system was nearly exhausted. Many persons could be seen 
actually driving a dying horse. I myself had the greatest 
difficulty in obtaining horses to do my work, my own being 
laid up for several days. 
In every case the animals needed support, and from my 
mode of treatment I only lost five out of more than 2000 
cases. 
Those which died did so either from hydrothorax, hydrops, 
pericardii, or purpurea. Some sunk from ulceration suc¬ 
ceeding on laryngitis. 
At the beginning of November the disease assumed an 
oedematous form. Effusion of serum took place into the legs, 
and extending upwards affected the Avhole of the tender part 
of the abdomen and sheath. Sometimes effusion occurred 
in patches as large*as a man’s fist, and occasionally the head 
enlarged to such an extent that the breathing becomes so 
much impeded as quickly to cause asphyxia. 
In this stage the pulse is often imperceptible; animal 
immovable; breath fetid; tongue dry and furred, and mas¬ 
tication accomplished with the greatest difficulty. Very little 
urine is voided, and the fieces are small in quantity and 
dry. 
In such cases I have given trial to scarifications and hot 
fomentations of diluted vinegar, friction, and warm clothing. 
I have also dosed the animal with warm ale or porter, and 
exhibited tonics and diuretics in balls. 
The difference between this affection in its early stage and 
ordinary influenza, or as Mr. Varnell, late of the ftoyal 
Veterinary College, designated it, bilious fever/’ is, that in 
