OUTBREAK OF SURRA FEVER. 131 



birds with their numbers increased, and the supply of insect food proportionately 

 diminished, might prove quite as destructive to the crops as the insects they had 

 exterminated, and it would be difficult to decide on which side the balance of 

 advantage to the cultivators would lie. 



5. For instance, the rosy pastor is a well-known destroyer of locusts, and 

 at the same time he is himself a rapacious consumer of millet ; should he be 

 specially preserved or specially destroyed ? 



6. The obvious conclusion, in the opinion of the undersigned, is that the 

 special protection of such birds in the interests of agriculture would be just as 

 likely, if it had any effect at all, to do harm as good. 



G. W. Vidal, 



Collector of Poona. 



MEMORANDUM ON AN OUTBREAK OF SURRA FEVER 



AT THE STABLES OF THE BOMBAY TRAMWAY 



COMPANY, LIMITED. 



By F. C. Rimington. 



Attached hereto is a statement giving particulars of 14 horses 

 belonging to the stud of the Bombay Tramway Company, which 

 were attacked with Surra Fever in the months of November and 

 December 1838. In addition to the record of the outbreak 

 supplied in that statement by our Veterinary Surgeon, we think it 

 well to add a few remarks : — 



Locality and Description of the Stahles.— It will be observed 

 that of the 14 cases of surra, 10 cases have come from the 

 Company's Parel Stables. That stable was constructed in 1886, 

 with accommodation for 174 horses, and the actual average 

 number of horses kept there during the two months, when the 

 outbreak prevailed, was 174. The stables are situated on the 

 Parel Road in the northern and most inland quarter of Bombay. 

 They are bounded on the north by an enclosure about 5,000 sq. 

 yards in area, which is used as a vegetable market, and skirted 

 on three sides by lines of brick-built chawls ; on the south by 

 an open space reserved for purposes of a proposed new station 

 by the G. I. P. Railway Company ; on the east by the Parel Road, 

 on the other side of which are the Victoria Gardens ; and on the 

 west by the G. I. P. Railway track, beyond which again, for 

 some distance, there is open land. About 2,000 ft. from the 

 stables the Flats commence : open, low-lying vacant land which 



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