The daily morning journal and courier. [volume] (New Haven, Conn.) 1894-1907, 1900-11-17
HORSES IN The TRANSVAAL
TIE MKSTERIOUS SOUTH AFRICAN
SICKNESS

flcan service than big ones, and tha
any little wiry animal which has beer
used to great extent to pick up its
own living will probably outlast a big
stable-fed hunter. In the Zulu war the
Cape-fed cobs of the mounted infantry
were fat, while the horses of the Sew
enteenth loncers looked like gray
hounds. The native-born horse could
be turned into field of green mealies
to eat it's fill. But green mealies
secured the English beasts, while dry
mealies gave them hampers" The
harder horse Is, the more likely it Is
to adapt itself to the rigors of 'veldt''
life. AS to feeding horses on the voy-
age to the Cape, a good deal of atten-
ton is necessarily given. One of my
sons, who has charge of an important
department In a great concern, was
asked to send in a price to the war Of
flee for provisioning many hundreds of
horses on the voyage out. He must
have worked it down to fine point, for
l noted that two dollars per head per
week was all that was charged, exclu-
sive of attendance, at which figure he
assured me a good profit was made
Most African Dutch farmers are big,
tall, f1eshy men, weighing on an aver
age twelve to fourteen stone, Many of
them are hige fellows of sixteen or sew
enteen stone. Yet under these welter-
weights, burdened with rifle cartridges,
food and other necessaries, the Cape
horse has fully demonstrated it's mar
velous powers of endurance, carrying
it's owner over long stretches Of diff
cult country, scurrying from position to
position, and subsisting on poor and
scanty fare. Under the South African
conditions, the Cape horse can always
beat those freshly imported from Eu-
rope, and especially over the long and
fatiguing Journeys made under a hot
sun and heavy burden-to which he Is
accustomed-the Africander nag can
easily defy all competitors,
Horse sickness-that most fatal and
mysterious of stock diseases in South
Africa-while 1t affects the native ami
mails visits our English-bred horses
even more severely. North of the Or
ange the disease is as rule, far more
deadly than in Cape Colony, and in
some districts from fifty to seventy-fve
per cent. of the horses are carried off.
The annual pecuniary loss is, of course,
enormous.
The further north one goes, the more
violent becomes this scourge of the
veldt. From February to the middle
of May the sickness RACES. 1t ceases,
Of ba f,.yt ctes Of +bal
South African winter make their ap-
pearance. There are two forms of dis
ease-din-siekte dhin sickness) and |
dikkop-siekte (thick-head sickness), |
the latter being the more deadly. The
disease comes on very suddenly. You
may have a long ride on a pony appa-
rently in the bloom of health, and an
hour after have to dismount and lead
an apparently dying animal. The
symptoms are unmistalzable; running
and dilated nostrils, from which issue
a thick, yellowish mucous and foam,
the hollows above the eyes swollen,
ffercely beating TANKS, an occasional
cough and general air Of detection; |
these tell their inevitable tale The
breathing becomes more and more la
DDG6u. anu dtdtil presently cIlSutu. |
Sometimes the poor beast dies within a
few hours of the seizure; sometimes it
will linger for days. If the animal re-
covers it Is ''salted," and far less like
ly to have the disease again in acute
form 1T is, therefore, doubly and even
trebly valuable, and for the hunting
veldt is worth three or four hundred
dollars An average unsalted pony can
be purchased up-country usually under
one hundred dollars. At the present
time I understand that, in consequence
of the war; such a pony will command
readily two hundred dollars. A salt
ed" horse is never so bright or so lively
as horse that has not been through
the disease The recovery is SLOW and
the beast is never the same as 1t was
before the sickness.
All sorts of remedies have been
tried for Inconsistencies; not one has
ever been effectual. Nor have the fol-
lowers of Pasteur exd Koch been able
to discover any means of incubation
against this dire pest. The disease is
usually more virulent in low-lying sit
marshes, pans and vleys are
very deadly. Horses sent to the hill
for the season often escape al Z
together Stabling is some slight pro-
lection, especially if the horse is care
fully kept from veldt grass; and there
seems little doubt that there is less $
LANCER if the beasts are not allowed to
craze until ten or eleven in the morn |
ng, when the sun has licked up all dew {
and moisture from the heritage. Vari- !
JUS remedies are used but none is reI- d
lble Nosebags sprinkled with carbol-
C powder, or painted with tar, are Of $
EN- kept on the horses all night. When
he disease is noticed, bleeding strong [
mustard and vinegar blisters, drench- V
S of carbolic and oil (forty drops of
arbolic in a pint of warm OLD hot TO- q
plenty of clothing, are I
emedies often recommended and tried G
too often, unfortunately, with but v
eeble effect To this hour horse-sick- L
Tess remains an almost incurable dis I
ase in South Africa. The actual cause I
death appears to be acute inflamma- u
on of the lungs and other parts, and T.
he animal usually dies of suffocation. U
One of the most painful incidents of /
his plague is that horses when Strick- =
n, almost invariably seek the compan-! I
1nship of mankind, as if asking in .
heir dumb fashion for relief. They y