CASE OF EXTENSIVE MELANOTIC DEPOSITS. 
829 
would be more than he was worth. The collar was altered, 
and iodine and other agents applied locally, but without any 
benefit. He was kept at his work, and I saw him only occa¬ 
sionally. The tumour slightly increased in size, and retained 
the oval form, the patient during the time feeding, looking, 
and doing well. 
September 22nd.—Mr. Brown again consulted me as to 
the propriety of removing the tumour, when I expressed my 
conviction, that melanotic deposits existed internally, al¬ 
though even now there was little or nothing to indicate their 
presence. After weighing in our minds the chances pro and 
con., it was decided to let the horse take his chance, so long 
as he did not work in pain. 
27th.—I received a hasty summons, as “ my patient had, 
after doing some ordinary work, been suddenly attacked with 
alarming symptoms. He staggered, refused all food, shivered, 
and sweated profusely.” On examination I found all these 
symptoms present in an aggravated form; and, in addition, 
the visible mucous membranes were blanched, the pulse im¬ 
perceptible, and every other indication of the animal’s sinking 
fast from internal haemorrhage. He was removed to a loose 
box, and lived about three and a half hours. 
28th.—The post-mortem examination revealed the melanotic 
tumour attached to thesternumtoweigfften and a half pounds, 
a large quantity of blood in the abdominal and thoracic cavities, 
and melanotic deposits within and upon the liver, kidneys, 
stomach, intestines, mesenteric glands, heart and lungs. The 
walls of the heart were soft and attenuated. The spleen was 
enormously enlarged, its shape altered, and its thickness 
increased to fully six inches in the centre by these deposits. 
On being placed in the scales it was found to weigh no less 
than six and a half stones, or fifty-two pounds. The brain 
was not examined, as decomposition had set in so rapidly, 
and the head and neck had become so much swollen The 
carcase emitted an offensive and very unusual odour. 
Melanosis is not an uncommon disease, but I have never 
met with it in any coloured horse except either gray or white. 
Is it always so? The largest spleen I had seen previously 
to this was one of twenty-four pounds, taken from an old 
white mare, at Arundel, in Sussex, in the year 1835. These 
cases show to what a great extent the spleen may become 
diseased without interfering either with the natural functions 
or the usefulness of the animal, and are in this respect alone 
of great interest to the pathologist. 
