ASCITES IN A COW. 
241 
certainly in the liquor, which the good fellows sipped out of the 
bottles made of this tree, and not in the nature of the wood.” 
From remote antiquity, then, it will be seen that opinions 
have been conflicting with regard to the subject. Still it is 
an interesting matter for investigation, and one which ought 
to be settled. I am notin a position to deny or to affirm that 
a decoction of yew may be poisonous, but I cannot help 
thinking that yew leaves, and especially in a dried state, 
where not digested, must cause mischief by some other method 
than that of acting as an irritant narcotic poison. 
In my previous communication upon this subject when 
speaking of barley cavings I meant to refer to the awns — i. e. 
the beards of the barley—and not to acorns as causing much 
of the irritation from which my calves and sheep suffered. 
ASCITES IN A COW. 
By Thomas D. Broad, M.R.C.Y.S., Bath. 
June 12th, 1872.— I was requested to go to E. Brooms, Esq., 
to examine an aged cow, bred from an Alderney and short¬ 
horn, and supposed to be in calf, and her time of gestation 
up; she fed well, but was an immense size. 
Upon examination I could not detect any calf, or any of 
the ordinary appearances of calving, beyond her large size, 
notwithstanding the statement of the cowman that he had 
seen the calf moving a fortnight previously. I told the 
owner that there was a large quantity of water in the abdo¬ 
men, whether she was in calf or not. In the course of the 
following fortnight I saw her two or three times, and found 
that she was getting such a size that when down she could 
not easily get up. I informed Mr. Brooms that it was pos¬ 
sible that tapping may relieve her, but there was a danger 
of hEemorrhage from rupture of the abdominal veins when 
the pressure from the water was removed; however, there 
was no other remedy, and I tied her to some rails in the field, 
and made a short incision through the skin with a scalpel 
about ten inches in front and a little to the right side of the 
udder. I then passed a trocar through the abdominal parietes 
and drew off thirty gallons of fluid, which did not appear to 
distress her; but, on the contrary, she appeared quite relieved, 
and fed as though nothing had occurred. The operation was 
performed in the morning, and about eight or nine in the 
evening she died. On the following morning my pupil made 
