Aston. — Chemistry of Bush Sickness. 289 



might have dropped into the sample while it was being dried, there being 

 always a certain amount of copper and brass dust in most laboratories. 

 For the work a room was therefore set aside in which copper utensils, 

 brass bunsens, and all apparatus containing copper were rigidly excluded, 

 and any brass fittings were coated with varnish. Further specimens were 

 obtained. and analysed, great care being taken to guard against adventi- 

 tious entry of copper into the assay. The results of analysis of these 

 specimens are given in Tables 3 and 4. They show that there is always 

 an excess of copper (compared with the amounts found by the authorities 

 quoted below) in the livers of sheep suffering from bush sickness, although 

 when these livers are extremely fatty the copper is diminished ; but if 

 calculated on the dried fat-free liver the percentage is always excessive. 

 Analyses of the livers of healthy sheep killed for consumption have 

 shown, however, that a comparatively large amount of copper in the 

 liver is quite consistent with health. Further, on dosing sheep and cattle 

 with copper-acetate for over a year their livers were found to take up 

 much larger amounts of copper than any liver hitherto examined with- 

 out producing any of the final symptoms of bush sickness. Feeding 

 experiments conducted by Mr. H. A. Reid, F.R.C.V.S., at Wallaceville 

 Laboratory, in which copper-acetate in small doses was given with the 

 food to sheep, showed that the liver could absorb large amounts of copper 

 and remain healthy. The greater part of the copper was no doubt elimi- 

 nated in the faeces. Some of the sheep died of a braxy-like disease, but 

 others remained healthy, and the experiments were discontinued after 

 they had been going on for seventeen months. Experiments with calves 

 and rabbits extending over a similar period yielded negative results, which 

 supports the experiments of du Moulin (Journ. Pharm., 5, 13, p. 189 ; 

 abst. in J.C.S., 1883, p. 483), who gave doses of from \ gram to 1 gram 

 of copper-subacetate every day for six weeks to dogs and rabbits without 

 producing poisonous effects. The bulk of the evidence at present is 

 against the hypothesis that copper is a causative agent in producing 

 bush sickness, but the results obtained are so full of interest that it is 

 deemed advisable to publish them at this stage. 



Copper is certainly a normal liver constituent in sheep and cattle. 

 Wynter Blyth (" Poisons," 1895, p. 613) states that a sheep's liver 

 contains 1 part of copper in 20,000 (0-005 per cent.), and quotes 

 Dupre's statement that in the kidneys and livers of ruminants copper 

 may always be found. Professor Malcolm informs me that the liver of 

 the ox normally contains 0-00225 to 0-0051 per cent, copper. Professor 

 Gilruth refers to articles by Lehman (Arch. f. Hygiene) in which the 

 author gives 0-0048 as the percentage of copper in dried ox-liver. In 

 sheep normally he found 0-0018 per cent, in the dried liver, but in 

 copper districts only half that quantity in the liver but five times that 

 quantity in the heart. Analysis of hearts from bush-disease areas do 

 not show any such excess of copper. 



Ellenberger and Hofmeister (Beid. Centr., 1883, pp. 606-9 ; abst. in 

 J.C.S.. 1884, p. 474) experimented with sheep, giving doses of \ gram to 

 3 grams. Among the negative results they obtained were no alteration of 

 the muscular structure, no acceleration of the motion of the heart, no 

 uniform alteration in the microscopic appearance of the blood-corpuscles, 

 no alteration of the respiration nor of the secretion of the urine. 

 Amongst the positive results were the presence of albumen, blood, and 

 bile in the urine, flaccidity of the muscles, weakness, and loss of appetite. 

 They note that the excretion of copper from the system is chiefly by the 

 10 -Trans. 



