436 Tr ansae tions . — Miscellaneous . 



Professor Thomas is able to tell me anything about this ; so 

 I can but be guided by my practical experience. This is why 

 I object to rabbit-fencing. I wish free, open fences for the dog 

 and natural enemy to disseminate the tape-worm ova. 



With regard to the danger of the sheep becoming fluked, 

 I have never heard of a single case of the sort in the Wai- 

 rarapa during the six years the disease has evidently been 

 silently at work amongst the rabbits. Nor do I think that 

 the bladder-worm of the rabbit can possibly infect the intes- 

 tines of the sheep. Each order of nature has its own check. 

 This can be seen from the fact that there are some two hun- 

 dred and fifty different sorts of tape-worm. The rabbit might 

 carry the proper sheep-fluke about in occasional instances, 

 but I do not think that the sheep could possibly carry the 

 rabbit-fluke about. At any rate, my sheep have been running 

 upon my badly-infected rabbit-fluked lands, and no instance of 

 death has yet occurred. 



I need scarcely point out the severity of any tape-worm 

 disease. A few years since seven hundred thousand pigs 

 died near Chicago from trichinosis ; last year a score of 

 thousand hoggets died from lung- worm in the southern portion 

 of this North Island of New Zealand ; millions of sheep die 

 in England from sheep-fluke. These are but instances of 

 the severity of nature's laws. And nature's proper laws 

 are continuous; not like M. Pasteur's remedy, or our own 

 winter poisoning. How well do we know here that the 

 rabbits grew proof against the poisoned grain, and refused to 

 take it ! So will the rabbits grow proof against cholera- 

 microbes. Even a few fowls in each hen-roost always escape 

 the ravages of chicken-cholera. Again, there were, and are 

 still, many places in the South Island where we could not 

 lay the poisoned grain. This escape from poison and disease, 

 and these inaccessible places, yearly afford bases for the 

 rabbits to breed up again. But there is no escape from 

 bladder- worm or liver-rot. 



With respect to the time the disease takes to effect the 

 death of the rabbit. Professor Thomas mentions thirteen and 

 twenty-one days after infection. We have always thought 

 it took longer, but Professor Thomas thinks that he can make 

 the disease even still more fatal. This is good news ; but I do 

 not think there is any necessity for it to be more fatal than it 

 is. My run is clear now from the pest. I keep but one 

 rabbiter and a pack of dogs over twelve thousand acres, and 

 he catches about twenty-five rabbits a week. He could look 

 after twenty thousand acres just as easily as twelve thousand. 

 (I do not think his time thrown away in regularly going round 

 the run. He saves his wages in other directions.) I am, 

 however, indifferent what disease is selected, provided one of 



