The signs that announce the advent of mad staggers, from whichever cause the disease may arise, are always alike. The lid is raised, and the eye assumes an unnatural brightness. The nasal membrane reddens; the surface becomes as hot as it was previously deficient in warmth; the movements are quick and jerking. The breath is no longer laborious—it is rapid, sharp, and drawn with a kind of panting action. The whole appearance is altered. The characteristics of approaching frenzy can hardly be mistaken.
THE HORSE DURING THE MAD STAGE OF STAGGERS.
Then comes the most painful duty of ownership over life. The proprietor has, then, to make a speedy choice, whether his dumb servant is to take a desperate chance and undergo a torture for which the concentrated pleasure of many lives could not atone, or be deprived of the fatal power to injure others and itself. Humanity would unhesitatingly pronounce for death, and, in this case, there is need of haste. The symptoms are so rapidly matured, that, in ten minutes, the poor horse may be sadly hurt and bleeding, panting and rearing, in the center of a desolated stable. A mad horse is a terrible object! Its strength is so vast that ordinary fastenings yield before it; but the animal, even when deprived of reason, wins our respect. Suffering will find expression in energetic action. Man, when a tooth is about to be extracted, generally clinches something; but what were a hundred teeth to the agony which causes every fiber in the huge framework to quiver? The perspiration rolls off the creature's body. The eye glares with anguish, not with malice; the body is strangely contorted, but there is no desire to injure. Who, contemplating such a picture, could forbear speaking the word which should grant peace to the sufferer, although the order necessitate some violence to the feelings of him who is invested with power to command?
MEGRIMS.
So little sympathy exists between man and horse, so little are the ailments of the animal really studied, that the likeness between certain diseases affecting the master and the servant have not been observed. Megrims, evidently, is a form of epilepsy; yet, to speak of an epileptic horse would, probably, induce laughter in any society. Notwithstanding which, man is not isolated in this world: he is associated with the creatures of the earth not only by a common habitation, but by similar wants and like diseases. He is united by nature to every life that breathes. His heart should feel for, and his charity embrace, every animal which serves him. He has his duty toward, and is bound by obligations to, every creature placed under his control. None are so subject to his will as is the horse; none have such powerful claims to his kindness and forbearance. The noble animal is begotten by man's permission; its course in life depends upon his word: for his service it surrenders everything—freedom, companions, and paternity—it relinquishes all. Its owner's pleasure becomes its delight; its master's profit is its recreation. It is the perfect type of an abandoned slave; body and soul, it devotes itself to captivity. It is sad to think how bitter is its recompense, when an obvious similarity, even in affliction, has not to this hour been recognized.
Megrims, like epilepsy in man, will in certain subjects appear only during some kind of exertion. In others, it will be present only during particular states of rest. It is uncertain in its attacks. It is not understood; and of the many theories which have been advanced, none explain it.
All horses may show megrims; some when at work, and some only while in the stable; others in the glare of day, and a few during the darkness of night; but of all, draught horses are the most liable to the malady. This may be because harness horses are subjected to the most laborious and most continuous species of toil. A horse fettered to a vehicle obviously must strain to propel as much or as long as the person intrusted with the whip thinks the animal should draw. Men's consciences, where their own convenience and another's exertions are the stake, generally possess an elastic property. It takes a great deal to stretch them to the utmost. An Arabian proverb says, "it is the last feather which breaks the camel's back;" but the English driver knows the entire pull is upon the collar, and he is moved by no considerations about the back. If the whip cannot flog the poor flesh onward, a shout and a heavy kick under the belly may excite the spasm, which, in its severity, shall put the load in motion.
Age does not influence the liability to megrims. The colt, which has done no work, may exhibit the disease, and the old stager may not be subject to its attacks. One horse may die in the field from exertion and never display the malady; another shall be led through the streets and exemplify megrims in all its severity. One shall be merely dull—the disorder shall never get to the acute stage, though the fits may be repeated. This last, to the surprise of its master, shall every now and then stop, stare about, and proceed as though nothing were the matter. A second, when mounted, will be seized by a sudden impulse and run into shop doors; while a third, being between the shafts, will be possessed with an irrepressible desire to inspect the driver's boots.
The horse often becomes suddenly stubborn. The reins are jagged and the whip plied to no purpose. The animal will only go its own way, which is commonly beset with danger. Perhaps, it may persist upon galloping, head foremost, down an open sewer; probably, it will rush up the steps leading to some mansion, and beat the door in with tremendous knocking.