Cattle 1853 - Lewis Family Farm

OTHER DISEASES OF THE EYE. 161
When this termination threatens, the globe of the eye -will usually
turn to a bottle-green color, then ulceration will appear about the
centre of it, and the eye will become of three or four times its
natural size, or it will gradually diminish and sink into the orbit.
The fluid discharged from it will be so acrid that it will excoriate
the parts over which it runs, and the
ulcerated.
lids will become swollen and
The most humane method to be adopted with regard to the animal,
is to remove the eye. If the owner does not think proper to
adppt this, let him try to make the beast as comfortable as he can.
The part should be kept clean, and when there appears to be any
additional inflammation, or swelling, or pain, the eye should be well
fomented with a decoction of poppy-heads.
Homoeopathic treatment.—The cure is easily effected, when the
case is taken in time ; commence with a few doses of aconitum,
which is to be employed at first from hour to hour ; then at longer
intervals. Resort afterwards to arnica. If it be too late, conium
must be given, which is also indicated when aconitum and arnica
have removed the inflammatory symptoms, but there is an exudation
between the laminae of the cornea. Cannabis, belladonna, or euphra-
sia, in two ounces of distilled water, form an excellent topical application
; but they should also be used internally. If the ophthalmia
has- been occasioned by a foreign body in the eye, it calls for a dif-
• ferent treatment. Extract the foreign body with a bit of moistened
linen ; conium then removes the symptoms, and if there have been
any injury, arnica should be prescribed, both externally and inter-
nally. Ophthalmia caused by cold soon yields to aconitum, bryonia,
dulcamara, and euphrasia.
- When the disease proceeds from an internal cause and is peri-
odical, it is hereditary, or depends on the deposition on the eye of
a morbific principle difficult to be determined. The chief means
to be employed are sulphur, euphrasia, pulsatilla, cannabis, conium,
and causticum. Belladona might also be tried. Calcarea c'arbonica
is useful in the case of turbid vision with a bluish tint of the cornea
—the lids not being affected.
OTHEU DISEASES OF THE EYE.
There is a singular disease of the eye, not properly ophthalmia,
sometimes epizootic among cattle, that sadly frightens the owner
when it first appears. Young cattle pasturing on wet and woody
ground are suddenly seized with swellings of the tongue and throat,
and eruptions about tlie membrane of tha mouth, and the eyes become
intensely inflamed, and superficial ulcers appear on the cornea.
This is only one of nature's- methods, singular indeed, of getting rid
of something that offended the constitution ; and the way is to let
iier nearly alone. The skillful practitioner foments with warm water,