WHY ? 
163 
articulations, due chiefly if not wholly to the grave lesions in the 
ilio-patellar muscles, but in the case related, the affection of 
these parts being wanting, this symptom too was absent. 
This case affords special support to our view of the pathology 
of the disease, since although the patient had been somewhat 
restricted in diet and very gently exercised, whieh would under 
ordinary conditions have prevented the disease, yet these were 
more than counterbalanced by the extreme water starvation 
which should, if our contention be true, be even more effectual 
in the production of the disease than the slight and brief decrease 
in the amount of food and the very deficient exercise imme¬ 
diately prior to the casting in its prevention. 
These circumstances lead us to believe that the causing of 
animals in a state bordering on azoturia to drink freely of water 
just prior to their first labor after a period of rest would tend to 
prevent in many cases the advent of the disease, and emphasizes 
the importance of relying in our treatment of azoturia, as we 
have long done, chiefly upon inducing the animal to consume as 
much water as is possible, and lends force to the belief which 
we have for some years held, but not tested, that the most efficient 
and rational treatment for the disease in its initial stages consists 
of the intra-venous injection of water or a ^ or i per cent, solu¬ 
tion of sodium chloride. 
WHY? 
By W. L. Rhoads, D.V.S. , Lansdowne, Pa. 
A Paper read before the Pennsylvania State Veterinary Medical Association, March 3,. 
1897. 
Why^ my fraternal brothers, you ask, have I chosen such a 
subject. Why it allows me scope for a number of inquiries and 
assertions as the subject would of itself suggest. 
Why are we veterinarians, as a elass, prone to travel our own 
individual route or rut ? I use the latter term advisedly, for too 
many of us are at present wearing a rut, or perhaps a myriad of 
ruts, which will be found very hard to leave when we are at 
