170 ON INOCULATION AS A MEANS FOE THE 



re-inoculated animals do exhibit all the signs of fever, tumefac- 

 tion, &c., as those only once operated upon ; others also resisting 

 it just as they resist it the first time. 



It remains for us to notice another important proposition set 

 forth by Willems, viz., the transmission of the "virus" from one 

 animal to another by what is technically known as " removes," 

 from the first source of the disease. The practice was established 

 in imitation of vaccination, by which the lymph of the disease is 

 caused to become milder, safer, and equally efficacious as the 

 original virus. The promoter states that he has carried the 

 virus through five removes, and with the satisfactory results 

 that no deaths and fewer casualties have arisen, but he adds, in 

 unconscious contradiction, that he prefers the original serous 

 exudations from the diseased lungs.* 



Dr Willems maintains that a special corpuscle, having a tre- 

 mulous motion, is developed in the products of pleuro-pneumonia, 

 and that this constitutes the means by which the disease is 

 communicated. Professor Simonds "f informs us that he examined 

 morbid products with Dr Willems, at Hasselt, using the same 

 microscope, but failed to discover anything but the ordinary 

 proceeds of inflammation. The assertion, it is necessary to state, 

 is at this moment as far from confirmation as when first uttered. 



Notwithstanding that a great deal of information has been 

 gained in reference to the question of inoculation for pleuro- 

 pneumonia, and that since 1852 the various countries of the 

 world have taken up the inquiry, and experiments have been 

 performed upon many thousands of animals, the great question of 

 the efficacy of the proceeding is but ver}^ imperfectly understood. 

 It is likewise well known that hundreds of British dairymen, we 

 may say the major portion, have regularly inoculated their cattle, 

 yet we are no nearer the extermination of the dreadful scourge. 

 A cynical writer in " The Farmer " \ says, in quoting from Mr 

 Bruce's report to the Government of New South Wales, that 

 eighteen out of twenty j)ersons there are in favour of it, yet " Here 

 veterinary science — falsely so-called — stops the way of even a 

 public experiment on a small scale. It will be time soon 

 for us to educate our masters." We fail to see how veterinary 

 science has put a stop to the trial of inoculation for pleuj'o- 

 pneumonia, for if eighteen out of twenty in New South 

 Wales are satisfied wuth their experiments, and so many dairy- 

 men here still continue to go on with it, it appears they have it 

 very much their own way, and we look to these men to inform 

 us what they have done in the way of mitigation. Newspaper 

 paragraphists have had too much say on the matter, and have 

 too freely expressed opinions on this and kindred subjects of 



* Professor Simonds, opt. cit. t Ibid. 



X August 16, 1875. 



