Diseases of the heart in domestic animals 
159 
the same.” Not taking into consideration that such an expres¬ 
sion ought not to be found in a work on professional science, it 
leads the practitioner to culpable negligence and superficiality, 
which cannot be vindicated, for a special ailment is difiicult to 
diagnosticate. . The unitary therapeutics is in this case a model, 
which is absolutely rejectable. 
The heart diseases among domestic animals are most difiicult 
to diagnosticate, nevertheless it is possible to determine the 
affections of the heart, if one considers all the elements which 
influence the formation of the affection. It is self-evident a pre¬ 
cise consideration of the anatomical, physiological and functional 
conditions of the heart and the vessels in the normal state is pre¬ 
sented, in order to draw a conclusion and a comparison with the 
abnormal state. 
The organism should be an open book before the eyes of the 
professional man ; for a minute deliberation of all the contribut¬ 
ing factors in the function of the heart is a conditio sine qua non 
to a diagnosis of the affections of the heart. 
I shall therefore endeavor, in the first place, to bring forth 
all those moments in the functions of the heart’s mechanism, 
which are necessary to the diagnostic fulcrum, and shall, in 
order to avoid repetitions, confine myself to such arguments only 
which can suggest such fulcrums. 
We shall now pay attention to the normal heart and its func¬ 
tions of a healthy animal. 
The heart appears as a hollow muscle freely suspended from 
the great vessels, the veins and arteries, in the cavity of the chest, 
and attached by the pulmonary arteries and veins to the lungs, 
and by the posterior vena cava to the diaphragm. It represents 
a slightly compressed one freely suspended in the pericardium, 
with its blunted point on a level witli the fifth rib or somewhat 
behind it, and its base tapering almost circularly under the third 
to the seventh dorsal vertebrae. The position is by no means to 
be overlooked, for the slightest deviation must necessarily call 
forth manifold disturbances of the functions. In consequence of 
the muscular quality the heart is subjected to all those processes 
which are common to the muscles. The heart receives its blood 
