ACUi'E INDIGESTION, ETC. 371 
I think it a safe estimate that ninety-five out of every one 
hundred cases of flatulent colic would recover without any medi¬ 
cal treatment whatever, provided the patient is afforded room, 
rest, bedding, pure air and the attendance of good grooms or 
nurses to prevent injuries. 
The other five,being appalling cases, would imperatively require 
the attendance of a qualified veterinarian to prevent, if possible, 
fatal results. 
However, as it is difficult to prognose in the outset of any given 
case, how serious an aspect it may assume, or what the result 
will be, a qualified veterinarian should be called in attendance in 
every case, when such services can be obtained. The veterina¬ 
rian should be present for the following purposes : First, To see 
that the patient is placed under favorable conditions in regard to 
stabling, bedding, pure air, clothing, watchful attendants, etc. 
Secondly, to administer such remedies as have a tendency to assist 
nature in her efforts to remove the difficulty; and, thirdly, when 
nature and the ordinary medical remedies, prove unequal to the 
contest, to summon to the front the bold hand of the surgeon, to 
attack and liberate with the trocar the imprisoned and confined 
gases, so that they will no longer threaten rupture or suffocation 
by their pressure, or poison the blood by being absorbed. 
With regard to medical remedies, nearly every practitioner 
has his favorite. Yet, we advise that any and all of them should 
be used with scrupulous care and judgment, lest with too free use 
of even a good remedy, injury instead of good is wrought. 
Before offering any suggestions in regard to medical treatment 
on this subject, it will be proper for me to consider, first, the 
questions that naturally present themselves. What are the causes 
and pathological conditions existing in this disease ? To the first 
of these questions I will answer, that horses predisposed to flatu¬ 
lent colic are often observed to have capacious bellies, voracious 
appetites, are hasty eaters and often devour, with apparent relish, 
filthy straw that has served for bedding, etc. In cases of this 
kind we have an illustration of both constitutional idiocyncrasy 
and faulty structural organization combining to produce the 
disease. 
