Cattle 1853 - Lewis Family Farm

CHAPTER XIV.
THE URINARY ORGANS AND THEIR DISEASES.
THE KIDNEYS.
The blood contains much watery fluid, which, after it has answered
certain purposes connected with -digestion, or the various secretions,
is separated and carried out of the frame. The kidneys are the
main instruments by which this is effected ; and they are often called
into increased action in order to compensate for the deficiencies of
other parts. When the usual discharge of perspiration from the
skin is suspended, the kidney takes on increased activity ; and when
fluids are accumulating in the frame generally, or in particular parts,
they escape by means, of these organs. Also other substances, the
accumulation or the continuance of which in the frame would be
injurious, are got rid of by means of the kidneys. The essential
principle of the urine (the urea) is one that would be noxious, or
perhaps destructive.
The kidneys are two glandular substances, attached on either
side to the spine beneath the muscles of the loins. They are not,
however, exactly opposite to each other, but the left kidney is pushed
somewhat backward by the great development of the rumen. A
very large artery runs to each. The quantity of blood which that
vessel carries shows the importance of the kidneys, and well accounts
for the inflammation and other diseases to which they are occasion-
ally subject. These arteries divide into innumerable little branches,
coiled upon and communicating with each other in a singular manner
and the blood, traversing all these convolutions, has its watery and
noxious ingredients separated in the form of urine, which is carried
on to the bladder, while the portion that remains is returned to the
circulation by means of the veins, which bear a proportionate size to
that of the arteries.
As the process of digestion is so perfectly performed in cattle,
and all the nutritive, and some, perhaps, of the noxious matter which
the food contains, taken up and received into the 'circulation, the
kidneys have much to do in order to complete this process of separation
;^they are therefore large ; are complicated in their appearance;
they present an assemblage of different lobes" or lobules, separated
by deep scissures ; there are ample provisions made for their secu-
;