No. 1.
Barbadoes aloes 6 dr. to 1 oz.
Calomel 2 dr.
Oil of peppermint 20 drops.
Warm water 1 pint.
Tincture of Cardamoms 2 oz.
Mix for one dose.
No. 2.
Common salt 4 oz.
Ginger 2 dr. or 2
teaspoonfuls.
Carbonate of soda 1 oz.
Water 1 quart.
Mix for one dose.
About a quart of water may be given every now and then with a horn; and
if a teaspoonful or two of compound spirit of ammonia (sal volatile) be
added to it, the effect will be promoted. A tablespoonful or two of
common salt may also be added three or four times a day. The horse
should be drenched and clystered during the night as well as the day; in
short, without unremitting attention success must not be
expected.—_Montagu_—_White._
STOMACHIC, _s._ A medicine for the stomach.
STONE, _s._ Stones are bodies insipid, hard, not ductile or
malleable, not soluble in water; calculous concretion in the
kidneys or bladder.
STONECHATTER, _s._ A bird; the wheatear.
STONEFLY, _s._ An insect.
STONEHAWK, _s. obs._ A kind of hawk.
STONEHORSE, _s._ A horse not castrated; a stallion.
STONEPLOVER, _s._ A bird, commonly called the red godwit.
STOOLBALL, _s. obs._ A play where balls are driven from stool to
stool.
STOOP, _v._ To bend down; to bend forward; to submit; to descend
from rank or dignity; to come down on prey as a falcon: to
alight from the wing.
STOOP, _s._ Act of stooping; fall of a bird upon his prey.
STOP, _v._ To hinder from progressive motion; to teach dogs to stand
to game.
_Stopping for the Feet._—A mixture of clay and cowdung, or either of
these separately, is commonly used for this purpose; and, by keeping the
bottoms or soles of the feet moist and cool, often does good. In soles
that are too thin and soft, or for the frogs when in that state, the
following composition is more proper:
Tallow and tar, of each 1 lb.
To be mixed by melting together.
Mr. Goodwin has contrived a kind of boot for keeping the feet cool and
moist, as well as for applying the above composition.—_White._
STORK, _s._ A bird of passage, famous for the regularity of its
departure.
STRAGGLER, _s._ A wanderer; a rover; anything that separates from
the rest, or stands singly.
STRAIN, _v._ To squeeze through something; to purify by filtration;
to sprain, to weaken by too much violence; to put to its utmost
strength.
STRAIN, _s._ An injury by too much violence; race, generation,
descent.
STRAND, _s._ The verge of the sea or of any water; a division or
portion of a rope.
STRANGLES, _s._ A disease incident to young horses.
The treatment of strangles is very simple. As the essence of the disease
consists in the formation and suppuration of the tumour under the jaw,
the principal, or almost the sole attention of the practitioner should
be directed to the hastening of these processes; therefore, as soon as
the tumour of strangles evidently appears, the part should be actively
blistered. Old practitioners used to recommend poultices, which, from
the thickness of the horse’s skin, must have very little effect, even if
they could be confined on the part; and from the difficulty and almost
impossibility of this, and their getting cold and hard, they must weaken
the energies of nature, and delay the ripening of the tumour.
Fomentations are little more effectual. A blister will not only secure
the completion of the process, but hasten it by many days, and save the
patient much pain and exhaustion; and it will produce another good
effect—it will, previous to the opening of the tumour, abate the
internal inflammation and soreness of the throat, and thus lessen the
cough and wheezing.
If there is much fever, and evident affection of the chest, and which
should carefully be distinguished from the oppression and choaking
occasioned by the pressure of the tumour, it will be proper to bleed.
A few cooling medicines, as nitre, emetic tartar, and perhaps digitalis,
may be given, as the case requires. The appetite, or rather the ability
to eat, will return with the opening of the abscess. Bran-mashes, or
fresh cut grass or tares, should be liberally supplied; which will not
only afford sufficient nourishment to recruit the strength of the
animal, but keep the bowels gently open. If the weakness be not great,
no further medicine will be wanted, except a dose of mild physic, to
prevent the swellings or eruptions which sometimes succeed to strangles.
In cases of debility, a small quantity of tonic medicine, as camomile,
and gentian with ginger, in doses of a couple of drachms, may be
administered.—_The Horse._
STRANGURY, _s._ A difficulty of urine, attended with pain.
STRAP, _s._ A narrow long slip of cloth or leather.
STRAW, _s._ The stalk on which corn grows, and from which it is
threshed.
STRAWCOLOURED, _a._ Of a light yellow.
STREAM, _s._ A running water; the course of running water; current.
STRETCHER, _s._ Anything used for extension; the timber against
which the rower plants his feet.
STRIDE, _s._ A long step, a wide stretch of the legs; the pace of a
horse.
STRINGHALT, _s._ A sudden twitching and snatching up of the hinder
leg of a horse much higher than the other.
STRIPE, _s._ A lineary variation of colour; a shred of a different
colour; a weal, or discoloration made by a lash or blow; a blow,
a lash.
STRUCTURE, _s._ Act of building, form, make; edifice, building.
Under the term _Structure of the Eye_, Mr. White, describing its anatomy
and physiology, divides the subject into two parts, that is, the eye
itself and its appendages. Under the latter head, he comprehends the
eyelids, the muscles which move it, the eyelashes, the lachrymal gland,
the puncta lachrymalia, and lachrymal duct, the caruncle of the eye, the
haw, and the membrane named conjunctiva, and the muscles by which the
eye is moved.
He then proceeds:—Having described the appendages, as they are termed, I
shall proceed to a description of the eye itself, the structure and
economy of which is most curious and interesting. It is said to be
composed of coats and humours, and this perhaps is the best manner of
considering it. The first coat that appears is the cornea, or glass of
the eye, which forms the anterior part, and is beautifully transparent.
It is not of a circular form, as in man, but of an irregular oval, or
rather oblong form, when examined out of the socket; but in its natural
situation in the living horse, that part which projects beyond the
eyelids is of a regular oval, or rather of an oblong form, and
corresponding in some degree with the form of the pupil. It forms a
larger portion of the globe of the eye than in man, and, by its
convexity, causes the rays of light which pass through it to converge
towards the pupil. This convexity may be too great or too little, and in
either case render vision somewhat imperfect, and cause starting. The
convexity of the cornea is preserved by the fluid which it incloses,
named aqueous humour. On puncturing the cornea this fluid escapes, and
then the cornea becomes flat and wrinkled. On removing the cornea the
iris appears, which is a thin delicate brown or blackish muscle, with an
oblong hole in the centre, named pupil. The iris is composed of two
orders of fibres; the one circular, which, by contracting, diminishes,
and even closes the aperture in the centre, named pupil; the other
radiated, which by contracting, opens or enlarges the aperture or pupil.
The second humour of the eye is situated immediately behind the pupil,
and is named crystalline humour, or crystalline lens. On taking it out
it appears to be a solid and beautifully transparent double convex lens,
the posterior surface of which is more convex than the anterior one. It
is found to become denser and denser from the circumference to the
centre, and the slightest pressure so deranges it as to lessen or
destroy its transparency.
The crystalline humour may be considered as composed of numerous
concavo-convex lenses, admirably fitted to each other; those of the
largest size having their circumference or edge opposed to and nicely
joined to each other, thus forming altogether a double convex lens. The
point of union between the two largest lenses is embraced by a band of
muscular fibres, disposed in a circular direction, and named the ciliary
ligament. These, by contracting, assisted probably by the muscles of the
eye, increase the convexity of the crystalline lens, or rather of the
series of concavo-convex lenses, of which the eye is composed, in a
manner so just and equal, as to adapt it to the distance of the object
at which the animal is looking, while, by the relaxation of these
muscular fibres, the convexity of the lens is diminished by its own
elasticity. These changes take place with inconceivable rapidity and
accuracy. There are other muscular fibres proceeding from the band of
circular fibres named ciliary processes, in a straight, or rather
radiated, direction, towards the second coat of the eye, named tunica
choroides; these are so arranged as to be drawn into folds, by which
disposition they are enabled to perform their office more easily, which
is that of drawing the lens towards the optic nerve, and thereby
increasing the intensity of vision, whereby the animal is enabled to see
small objects distinctly. The crystalline lens is inclosed in a
transparent capsule, which is not in contact with it, there being about
one drop, as it is computed, of a transparent liquid interposed, which,
from the anatomist’s name who first observed it, has been called ‘liquor
Morgagnii.’
I have seen a case where the convexity of the lens has been so
increased, by an unusual degree of contraction of the circular fibres,
named ciliary ligament, that it burst the capsule, and was forced out of
its situation. I found it lying with its posterior convex surface on the
inferior margin of the iris; about half of it appearing in the anterior
chamber of the eye, as it is termed. The transparency of the lens was
not affected, at least, it appeared so to me, and I rather think the
accident had occurred, just at the time I observed it, from twitching
the horse violently. In cataract, a disorder in which the crystalline
lens becomes opaque, it always becomes globular in its form from an
irritable state of the band of circular fibres; the same effect may be
observed in the circular fibres of the iris, causing the pupil to be
small, even in a moderate light, while the inflammation is going on,
which occasions the cataract; but when the opacity is such as to exclude
the light from the posterior part of the eye, which contains the third
or vitreous humour, with the choroid coat, retina, and optic nerve, then
the circular fibres relax, and the radiated fibres draw up the iris
somewhat irregularly, which adhering to the capsule of the opaque lens,
the pupil remains permanently open.
All that part of the eye which is posterior to the iris, is chiefly
occupied by the third, or vitreous humour, and it is in this humour that
the crystalline lens is imbedded. The vitreous humour is perfectly
transparent, and consists of a fluid, inclosed in numerous small
transparent cells, all of which appear to be inclosed in one delicate
transparent membrane, named tunica arachnoidea. If the vitreous humour
is cut, by snipping it with scissors, a fluid, like water, drops from it
freely, so that it appears to be nothing more than water, probably
holding a little salt in solution, which escapes when the transparent
cells are thus cut open.
That part of the vitreous humour in which the lens is imbedded is
different from the other parts, and of the consistence of jelly.
Immediately behind the ciliary ligament, as it is termed, the arachnoid
coat may be inflated with a small blowpipe, and made to resemble a
circular canal; this has been called from the name of the person who
first observed it, the circular canal of Petit. It is supposed to be
connected with the radiated fibres of the iris. I have seen the whole of
this humour in the eye of a sheep that had an hydatid in the right
ventricle of the brain, of the consistence of jelly.
It is now time to speak of the optic nerve, and its appendage, the
retina, with the third coat of the eye, named tunica choroides. The
retina is a delicate transparent membrane, which embraces the vitreous
humour, and is supposed to be an expansion or production of the optic
nerve, serving to receive the impressions of objects, in order that they
may be conveyed by the optic nerve to the organ of vision, named
thalamus nervi optici, or speaking of both organs, thalami nervorum
opticorum. After death, the retina becomes opaque, and of a light grey
colour. It is so delicate a membrane, that there is some difficulty in
preserving it for exhibition unless the eye is quite fresh. Under the
retina lies the choroid coat, which is nothing more than a plexus of
blood vessels, covered with a mucus substance of different colours. In
the human eye it is black, which is the cause of the human pupil, or
apple of the eye, appearing black; but in the horse it is variegated
with mucus of a purple, a blue, a green, and a black colour, which,
blending together, causes the pupil to appear of a dark blue colour.
This mixture of colours in the bottom of the eye, or choroid coat, has
been named tappetum lucidum.
The last and most considerable coat of the eye is the sclerotic coat,
which is a very strong thick membrane, including all the other coats and
humours, except the cornea. The sclerotic coat forms the greater portion
of the globe of the eye, and is intimately united towards the anterior
part with the cornea, which may be viewed as bearing the same relation
to the sclerotic coat, as the glass of a watch does to the case. By
maceration in water the cornea separates from the sclerotic coat
completely.
* * * * *
_Diseases of the eye._—Though the horse’s eye is commonly supposed to be
subject to a variety of diseases, they may, without impropriety, be
comprehended under two heads. That is, disorders which arise from
internal causes, and such as are occasioned by blows, bites, and other
accidents. The former are generally, I may say almost always, incurable;
that is, they are incapable of a perfect cure, or, in other words, the
eye is very rarely perfectly restored after being so affected, unless a
complete cataract, or total blindness, takes place in one eye.—_White._
STUB, _s._ A thick short stock left when the rest is cut off; a log,
a horse nail.
STUB-BARREL, _s._ _Vide_ BARREL.
STUBBLE, _s._ The stalks of corn left in the field by the reaper.
STUBBORN, _a._ Obstinate, stiff, inflexible; harsh, rough, rugged.