The Dorset County Express and Agricultural Gazette.
Dorchester, Dorset, England, 1865-09-05 00:00:00

titexature.

THE HISTORY, TREATMENT, AND PRIIVENTION 07
THg CATTLE PLAGUE. —Amid the many contra/die-
tory statements put forth as to the nature of the
malady now ravaging the herds in this country,
which are calculated to cause gross blunders to be
perpetrated in regard to its treatment, it is important
to learn from one qualified by his knowledge and
experience to speak with assurance on the subject,
the real character of the disease, and means whereby
its ravages may be reduced and its progress finally
arrested. Such information we find in a pamphlet
by Professor A. J. Murray, M.R.C. V.S , of the
Royal Agricultural College, Cirencester, just pub-
lished. The writer says that "the cattle plague"
may properly be termed the typhoid fever of the
ox, and makes the satisfactory statement that it
cannot be transmitted to the other species of domestic
animals or to men. He maintains that the Rinderpest
is propagated by contagion alone, and could not
have been introduced into this country in any other
way. He ridicules the notion that animals have
became diseased from the impure atmosphere of
ships, or that the Wile plague originated sponta-
neously in the cow-shads of London. The premises
upon whioh the writer bases his conclusions are folly
set forth, the history of the disease is traced from its
first introduction into England in 1744, the
sN triptoms of the disease are plainly indicated, the
post-mortem appearanoes stated, and the following
treatment recommended :
" In those cases where it is deemed expedient to
treat the disease, the following remedy may be ad-
miiiistered :
Dilute sulphuric acid . . . 3 ounces.
Tincture of gentian . . 6 ounces.
Distilled water . . . . 2 ounces.
This forms six doses, one of which may be given twice
a day in a quart of cold water. The fever may also be
abated by washing the animal's body daily with tepid
water, and afterwards drying it thoroughly. When
the Amass, extends beyond four days, two or three
ounces of whisky or gin may be given three times a day,
with the view of sustaining the animal. No nourish-
ment should be give,, except what the adimal partakes
of voluntarily. Linseed tea and porter, or ale may be
given when it begins to recover ; hay and a small
quantity of crusned oats may also be given. It must be
remembered, however, that treatment is not recom-
mended where there Is much risk of spreading the
oontagion."

With referenco to inoculation ma means of treating
this disease, which it will be remembered was sug-
gested to the meeting held reoently at Dorchester,
by the Hon. W. IL B. Portman, M.P., the Professor
says it does not appear to have been practised with
much enooess in other oountries, and mentions a
number of eases where it was tried. Next, the
writer asks :—ls the flesh of animals which have been
affected with typhoid fever injurious when partaken
of by human beings? This is a most important
inquiry at the present time. The Professor's opinion
being in the negative, and as such not likely to be
implicitly received without the most satisfactory
evidence in support of that view, we quote his re-
marks on the subject
"There is a large amount of evidence to show that it
is not so. Camper states that in 1745 large quantities
of the flesh of animals dying from this disease were
consumed in Holland without producing any malady
among the people. Id. Husard stated in his report to
the Parisian Faculty of Medicine, on the 28th of April,
1814, That as the fatal nature of the disease was
known to farmers, rather than lose those animals which
were seised with the disease, they sold them to butchers,
who killed them and sold the flesh as food. It is
fortunate that the meat is not unhealthy: all the
troops use it without experiencing any bad effects; it
has no other inconvenience than that of possessing very
little flavour; it is not even certain whether the flesh
of animals which have died from the disease is injurious.
At Paris the police oppose the sale of such meat."
"The allied troops have eaten the flesh of infected
animals before their arrival in France. They have used
it in all the departments to which contagion has been
carried ; it has been used by the inhabitants of Paris
and the suburbs, by the troops who occupy it, and by
those who surround it, for more then two months; it
has even been used by the patients in the hospitals;
their number has not been increased owing to the con-
gumption of diseased meat. No epidemic has existed
either among the soldiers or the people ; and the
typhns of man, which had preceded the disease among
beasts, has disappeared." M. Hazard also mentions
that the animals in the menagerie of the Natural
History Museum were fed on the flesh of the diseased
cattle without producing any eases of illness. In 1814
and in 1815 the disease was so widely spread in France
that probably the practice above referred to did not ex-
tend the area of the disease ; but if each a practice were
becoming common at present, the area of the disease
would be extended. As a matter of public policy it is
advisable, in the majority of instances, that the carcases
of diseased animals should be buried to prevent the dis-
semination of infection. The great object in the present
stage of affsire in to prevent the disease from extending.
It is not advisable to use the milk of diseased animals
though there are few well-authenticated oases in which
it has proved injurious.
- -

Finally, the following suggestions are made for
the prevention sir the disease :

"1. Whenever animals are observed to show symp-
toms of the disease, they should be separated from the
other stock, and one person should attend on those
animals solely; and all unnecessaty viaitors should be
exoluded from the diseased animals. They should on
no account be turned into fields adjoined roads. 2.
When the disease affects beasts severely, they should
be killed and buried six feet below the ground. 3. The
hides of diseased cattle should be washed in a solution
of chloride of lime. 4. Recently purchased cattle
should be kept in • separate shed for a fortnight.
6. All fodder and straw which may be used for the
disear.ed animals should he burnt, and the walls of the
shed or building% which they have been kept should be
washed with a solution of chloride of lime. 6. The at-
mosphere of a shed in which diseased animals have
been kept may be disinfected by impregnating it with
chlorine gas. For this purpose four ouness of bleak
oxide of manganese may be placed in a glass vessel, and
two ounces of hydrochloric soil poured on to it. The
doors of the shed should then be shut. This is sufficient
to disinfect the atmosphere of a shed in which twenty.
five animals have been kept. The chlorine will be given
off more freely if the mixture be stirred and the vessel
then placed upon a hot brick. 7. The excretions of
diseased animals should be mixed with chloride of lime;
and when it is not practicable to barn the litter and
fodder which have been used for them, it may be disin-
fected in a similar way, 8. The regular cleansing of
railway-trucks and steamboats can only be ensured by a
system of Government inspeotion, and is beyond the
seope of private interference. It is advisable that no
cattle should be sent to market from any stook among
which the disease has existed until three weeks have
elapsed since the last case was cured or destroyed. use
Bustriansand Prussians, from their proximity to Poland,
are very liable to invasions of the disease; but by esta-
blishing a cordon round the infected districts, and
slaughtering the diseased animals, the evtension of the
disease is prevented; all communication between in-
fected and healthy localities is interrupted until twenty
drys after the d pearanoe of the disease. By those
rigorous measurest e progress of the disease is checked,
and the malady is ultimately extirpated; but that a
similar result will be attained in this country is very
doubtful. The actions of individuals cannot be so easily
controlled in this country as in the Continental states.
It will be difficult to interrupt the communication
between healthy and iofecited localities; but unless the
most rigorous nie.vares are enforced, the plague will
• mtinue to spread.°
[We strongly recommend all ilterested in this
matter to proctre at once Professor Murray's
pamphlet as embodying the most compact, matter-
of-fact and business-like statement of the case that
la hither I. be n published.]

MR. BENJAMIN, Secretary of State of the late Con-
federate Government, has arrived at Southampton by
the Seine.

COUGHS, FIOARSINFSB, ASTHMA, or any irritation of
the Throat or Bronchial Tubes, relieved by allowing one
of "Brawn's Bronetial Tr.eltes" to dissolve slowly In
the mouth. Price, Is. lid. per box.—See Ad...rtisement
IMPORTANT TO ?aOTHIRS.—Mrs. Winslow's Soothing
Syrup for children teething, which has been so long in
use in the United States, is now Bold in this country, at
Is. lid. per bottle—See Advertisement.
FROM Rev. HRNIRT WARD BSICHRR, N.Y.—

" 'Brown's Bronchial Trochee.' It is five years since that
I atoidently entered your store for some sort of a pre-
paration for hoarseness. The Brown's Bronchial
Troches which you gave me entirely answered the pur-
pose which I had in view. Since then in KB my lectur-
ing tours I put troches ' in my carpet bag as regularly
as I do lectures or linen, and I have never changed my
mind respecting them from the first, except to think
yet better of that which I began in thinking well of."
—(See Advertisement in another co/umn.) Price Is lid.
per box.
The following is an extract from the Second Edition
(page 188) of the Translation of the Pharmacopreht of
the Royal College of Physicians, of London, by Dr. G.
F. Collier, published by Longman and Co. :—'' It is 110
small defect in this compilation (speaking of the
Pharmacopoeia) that we have no purgative mass but
what contains aloes; yet we know that hoemorrhoidal
persons cannot bear aloes, except it be in the form of
COCKLE'S PILLS, which chiefly' consists of aloes;
scammony, and cohxrynth, which I think are forme
into • sort of compound extract, the acridity of which
is obviated, I suspect, by an alkaline process, and by a
fourth ingredient (unknown to me) of an aromatic tonic
nature. I think no better and no worse of it for its
being a patent medicine. I look at it as an article of
oomineroe and domestic convenience, and do not hesi-
tate to say it is the best made pill in the kingdom ; a
muscular purge, a mucous purge, and • hydrogogue
purge combined, and their effects properly controlled by
a dingent and corrigent. That it cloot sot oosunionks
produce hasmorrhoids, like moist aloptio vale, I attribute
it. being thoroughly soluble, so that go undissolved
articles adhere to the mucous membrane.

• Litaddo : Tit