The San Francisco call. [volume] (San Francisco [Calif.]) 1895-1913, 1897-05-27
The Remainder Are Still Under
Treatment by DR.. |. w.
ORourke.
ALL ARE VERY SHAKY ON
THEIR LEGS.
A Mystery Hangs Around the Affair
and the Har Dor Police Are In.
vestigating.

For the last few days the What Cheer
stables, on jackson street, near Davis,
have resembled a veterinary hospital.
Over thirty horses have been sick for four
days, and during that time five have died.
Just whom the blame can be laid upon is
| in doubt but every employe OF Jacobs
Bros. asserts that the feed was poisoned.
Not a horse escaped and those that are
now alive were only saved by the unre-
uniting attention of DR.. l. w. O'Rourke.
1t appears that last Sunday new con-
signment of crushed barley was distrib-
uted among the various bins and the
evening meal was served to the horses
from it. The next day every animal was
sick. They had all the symptoms of
arsenical poisoning and the veterinary
was at once summoned. In spite of all
his efforts horse owned by ]. II. Kane d
Co., the com mission merchant; another
by t. Murray, the well-known boarding
house master; third by Middleton &
Co., the grocers; fourth by w. Schultz,
the wholesale liquor merchant, and fifth
by John Lubbin, all died. The others
have been watched day and night and
now nearly all of them are out OF danger.
All the animals are being treated for a
corrosive poison. Every hour they are led
from their own stalls into what the
stablemen call "the medicine chest"
There they are dosed with linseed
tea and other drugs. The operation is
a simple one. The horse is backed into a
stall and securely tied up. A running
moose is let down from the roof and the
animals upper lip is enclosed in it. AS
soon as everything is fast a man on the
other end of the rope begins to pull, and
in a few minutes the horses head is in the
air with his mouth wide open. Then the
medicine is poured down his throat.
Hour after hour the procession goes on.
Two men are kept constantly at work pre-
pairing the tea and two mors are con-
stantly filling quart bottles from the
buckets. Another man leads the horses
from their stalls, and still another adj
ministers the medicine. There is not an
idle man in the What Cheer stables these
days. All the horses seem to be affected
in the legs. They walk as if they had
corns, but their general condition could
not be noted as each animal was
blanketed. All of them that are left seem
to be improving, and, judging from the
care that is being bestowed on them, no
m ore deaths will follow.
1.-THE whole affair is o mystery to rue, !"
said Mr.. Jacobs yesterday. 1--WE have not
an enemy in the world. and how the feed
came to be poisoned don't know. Four
of the horses have died, but l think all
the others will recover The first meal
given to the horses made them all sick
When say the first meal / mean the first
meal from the new feed. 1t came direct
from the mills and was mixed in the sta
Bile, so just how the stuff that poisoned
the horses was put in is mystery that
the police will have to unravel."
The matter has been reported at the
Harbor Police station and detectives are
now at work on the case Twice day
DR.. O'Rourke goes to see the horses, and
he says that all that are left are out OF
danger. He also advised the Jacobs Bros.
to say nothing about the matter until the
police had had time to look into it. Sus-
picions point in one direction and devel-
opments are expected.
Murray horse was one of the best known
of its kind on the water front, and was as
intelligent rs q human being. Middle
TOMS gray was known from Meiggs wharf
TO the Mail dock, and Kane & Co.'S bay
could be trusted to find Washington
street wharf alone any day in the week.
Schultz's horse was PAGER and was we'll
known in the park, while Lubbin's was q
steady old roadster that never moved out
OF jog trot.