The management and treatment of the horse in the stable, field, and ...

92 The Management and Treatment of the Horse,
amount of blood to the nerves of the part, combined
with the pressure of the surrounding textures upon
them. It is accordingly most severe when the
surroundings are the most unyielding. With increased
heat of the surface, great thirst, dry skin, scanty and
hiffh-coloured urine, we have the most obstinate and
sluggish state of the bowels. Many different modes of
treatment have been recommended, and reasoning on
o-eneral physiological principles, the functions of the
alimentary canal are so tardily carried on that we cannot
insure the operation of a purge under twenty-four hours,
there being no animal but the horse in which acute
disease makes such sad havoc in so short a space of time.
Empty his stomach you cannot with an emetic, nor can
you purge in a few hours ; and, well knowing the obstinacy
of the bowels m this disease, our measure must be prompt
o act, for the grand purpose, if the groom or veterinary
t
surgeon desires to be successful, must be to conquer the
disease by resolution. As every other mode of termination
is unfavourable, to bring about this issue is the aim and
end of every one treating this malady, and as the nature
of the disease, its seat and the disorganisation which it
produces are well known, this result is not so difficult of
accomplishment as at first sight appears. In proof of
this I beg to ofter to my readers the treatment I have
found successful during a number of years' practice.
It as is follows : bleeding from the coronary plexus, give
aconite in ten-grain doses every hour in one pint of cold
water ; gently purge, give nitrate of potass, three drachms
in cold water every time the patient drinks, day and
night ; give half a pound of new yeast two or three times