The Sun.
London, England, 1865-08-25 00:00:00

The Cattle Plague.

Mr. Ebsworth, the medical officer of health for the parish
of St. Mary, Newington, attended before the sitting ma-
gistrate at Southwark, yesterday, to make a statement with
regard to the condition of the parish from the influx of
diseased cattle and the manner in which they were disposed
of.

The chief clerk (Mr. Edwin) communicated that the sub-
ject had been brought last week under the attention of Mr.
Woolrych, who had stated that ho had no power to order the
destruction of diseased cattle, but if the parties were sum-
moned for a nuisance thereby occasioned, he should be
enabled, on summons, to reach them with penalties.
Mr. Ebsworth, addressingthe magistrate (Mr. Burcham),
said that on that morning he received an order to attend
professionally a man who was seriously ill in Kent-street,
within the parish. While paying the visit to the patient,
his attention had been drawn to the condition of a slaughter-
house on the other side of the street, where, it was reported
to him, there were 15 cows which had been ordered by the
Government officer to be destroyed at the Bricklayers' Arms
station, and then to have been buried. The animals were
accordingly destroyed by a man in the employ of Mr. Geo.
Nicholls, the proprietor of the yard in question, and from
Mr. Nicholls he had learned that instead of the carcasses
of the animals being buried they were carted through the
parish of St. George's to Mitcham, where they were boiled
down and brought back through the parish of St.
Mary, Newington, in the shape of cats' meat. He could not
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Mr. Frederick
T. Stanley presented himself, and said he
accidentally had heard of the present application, and that
in consequence he had felt it his duty to attend, with a
view to explain that he was a member of the Royal College
of Veterinary Surgeons, practising within the precincts of
the court. He had been appointed an inspector of cattle
under the orders issued by the Privy Council. The order in
Council, which he produced, ran in the following terms :
" Every person within any district for which an inspector
shall be appointed on whose premises there shall be any
animal labouring under any such disease, shall as far as
practicable keep such animal separate and apart from all
the other animals, and any person who shall, without the
licence of such inspector, send to market, or remove from
his premises, any such animal which has been kept in any
shed or stable, or hoarded, or come in contact with others
labouring under the same disease, shall incur penalties un-
less they were conveyed to the horse slaughterer, there to
be disposed of." After this a fresh order was issued under
the authority of the Privy Council, that the animals thus
slaughtered should be sent to the manure works at Plum-
stead ; but his duty was to see that the carcasses, after the
animals had been slaughtered at Bricklayers' Arms station,
should be sent to the knacker's yard belonging to Mr.
Nicholls,whose name hasbeen mentioned by the applicant,
Mr. Ebsworth. In point of fact, he must mention that,
within the district, there were no means of burying the
carcasses of diseased and condemned animals, and in the
instance referred to they could not have been buried in the
cow-shed.

Mr. Burcham inquired where he could find the order in
Council to which reference had been made.

Mr. Stanley at once produced and handed in the printed
document issued under the authority of the Lords of Privy
Council, which

Mr. Burcham read as follows :—" That every animal