Cattle 1853 - Lewis Family Farm

CATTLE
in any other, the person -who attends the cattle should be present
when the beast is bled. It is impossible, by looking at the patient,
and considering the symptoms, to say what quantity of blood ought
to be taken away ; but, as a general rule, and especially in inflammation
of the lungs, and at the first bleeding, the blood should flow un-
til the pulse begins to falter, and the animal seems inclined to faint.
The faltering of the pulse will regulate the quantity of the afterbleedings.
Little bleedings of two or three quarts, at the commencement
of inflammation of the lungs, can never be of service ; from six
to eight quarts must be taken, or even more, regulated by the circumstances
that have been mentioned, and the blood should flow in a
large fullstream.
Physic will be plainly indicated, and it may be given to cattle In
pneumonia, generally with advantage, and always without apprehension.
It should, however, be of an unirritating kind. The purgative
effect "should be first produced by the Epsom salts, and kept
up by sulphur. In an acute inflammation, like that of the lungs, it
is necessary that the physic should act speedily, and yet it may accumulate
in the rumen. The practitioner hardly dare to unite with
it aromatic or stimulating matter in order to rouse this comparatively
insensible viscus to action, but he must have speedy recourse to the
stomach-pump, in the way already pointed out.
Blisters will here be especially indicated. The inflammation is no
longer that of the air-passages deep in the substance of the lungs,
but of their terminations, upon the surface of the lungs, as well as
everywhere else. It is difficult to cause a blister to rise on the thick
yet the common blister-ointment, thoroughly rubbed
skin of the ox ;
in, will occasionally have effect. The turpentine tincture of cantharides,
repeatedly applied, will cause considerable Swelling ; or, both
of these failing, there remain, in bad cases, boiling water and the hot
iron at command. Setons in the dewlap should never be omit
ted, and should be inserted immediately after the first bleeding,
and the purging drink given. Four drachms of nitre, two of extract
of belladonna, and one of tartarized antimony, may afterwards
be administered twice a day, in a drink.
Attention to diet is requisite, and warm water and mashes must be
regularly given two or three times a day.
Homoeopathic treatment.—Some doses of aconitum at short inter-
vals, (every hour or every two hours,) generally remove the violent
fever, after which some doses of bryonia (one morning and night,)
establish a perfect cure on the second or third day. It is scarcely
necessary to say that the beast must be carefully watched for some
time, and that it must be protected from damp and cold. Neglected
cases of pneumonia have been cured by means of china and nitrum,
after tubercles had probably been formed in the lungs. If the appe-
tite is not soon restored, nup vomica and arsenicum should be given.