Cattle 1853 - Lewis Family Farm

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PHTHISIS, OR CONSUMPTION. 273
acter. That veterinary surgeon is ignorant of his profession, who
does not at once, and at a distance, recognize the cough which,
although it may not precisely indicate phthisis, betrays a state of the
lungs pregnant with danger.
If the cough be sonorous and clear, the lung is not yet fatally
injured. That cough, however, must not be neglected long. It is
the product of inflammation, that may be silently, but rapidly,
disorganizing the lungs. The prudent man will not suffer such a
cough to continue many days, without giving a mash, or a dose of
physic ; or, perohance, bleedings and inserting a seton. This is one
of the points to which we cannot too often recur. It is new practice
—new doctrine ; the interests of the agriculturist are peculiarly connected
with it.
By-and-by, this cough becomes altered. It is no longer loud; and
dear, and careless; it is lower in its tone—feeble—hoarse. Mischief
has now been done, and perhaps of an irreparable kind. The farmer
will not always be able to point out the precise nature of the affection
of the chest from the sound of the cough ; but he will soon learn to
do it much oftener, and much more certainly, than he has hitherto
thought it possible. In simple catarrh there is an unchecked effort
of the lungs to force on the cough ; yet some hoarseness may attend
that cough, plainly referable to the upper air-passages; In bronchitis
there will also be a forcible effort ; the mucus is viscid ; and the
membrane of the tubes is thickened ; and the passage is diminished ;
and considerable force must be used to urge on a volume of air, and
to carry the mucus before it ; but it is a force which acts slowly, and
by pressure, for the membrane being' inflamed is tender. The cough
shows pain; it is no longer full and perfect; it is slowly performed,
and at the same time husky and wheezing, and the mucus rattles in
the passage as it is forced along. In pneumonia the cough is frequent—sore
; but it is not so sore as in bronchitis, for it has not the
same inflamed membrane to pass over ; it is, however, painful, for
the substance of the lung is inflamed, and therefore it is low, and, to
a certain degree, suppressed. In pleurisy, the cough is sharper,
spasmodic, yet not loud. Hitherto the pain has been confined to the
lungs ; here the lining membrane of the chest is affected, and intense
pain felt at every rising and falling of the chest ; therefore the cough
is short—it is cut short—it is somewhat spasmodic, and yet no louder
than can be helped.
The cough of incipient consumption is an inward, feeble, painful,
hoarse, rattling, gurgling one. It reveals fearful disorganization,
which can seldom be repaired. The process of disorganization is not
rapid. Weeks and months, or, under favorable circumstances, years,
may pass on, and few other symptoms be added to this peculiar
cough.
Here is disorganization of the lungs—disorganization which may
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