252 ON FEVERS AMONGST HORSES, CATTLE, ETC. 



the system before outward manifestations are produced, and from 

 this the attacks are continuous and mostly in succession, prevail- 

 ing for weeks and montlis, and ending only when there are na 

 more animals to kill. Enzootic or non-contagious maladies 

 depend for their production upon the wide-spread nature of the 

 cause. Of whatever nature that may be, it must exercise its 

 influence upon all alike, and at the same time, in order to pro- 

 duce the general and simultaneous seizures which are so com- 

 monly witnessed in this country. The disease also depends 

 entirely upon a cause quite independent of animals for its pro- 

 duction ; in other words, the death of one does not intensify the 

 cause and render its operation more severe upon others. The 

 production of the same or a similar malady by direct inoculation 

 is, to all intents and purposes, an accidental and altogether 

 foreign method, and must not be enumerated as one of the 

 natural causes of anthrax ; and if we exclude this, as it is thought 

 we very properly should, and limit our question to anthrax 

 disease, sui generis, we shall have no hesitation in treating it as 

 purely a non-infectious malady. By this we mean that healthy 

 animals do not contract the disease from the proximity, secre- 

 tions, or excretions of others labouring under it, and as healthy 

 and diseased may be confined in different parts of the same 

 building, fed and treated altogetlier or separately, no transmission 

 takes place. It is remarked that on certain pastures black- 

 quarter commonly prevails at certain seasons, and on certain 

 high lands sheep and young stock suffer from splenic apoplexy,, 

 but the animals of adjoining lands, separated only by a common 

 hedge or simple post and rails, escape entirely. The sheep of 

 the Highland farmer die of braxy after cold moonlight nights, 

 where folded on rich turnips, &c., but the disease is probably almost 

 unknown to the lowland farmer, who occupies the next holding. 

 We find also the anthrax fever or typhus of pigs much more com- 

 mon to the uncleanly farms of Ireland than to other parts of 

 Britain; the "blain" or glos-cmthrax* of cattle belongs only to 

 certain districts, and parturient apoplexy of cattle, apoplexy of 

 pigs, and heaving pains of ewes, depend more upon a system of 

 feeding than anything else, for where attention is paid to this 

 department, animals that are predisposed to these affections are 

 wonderfully preserved. 



From these statements w^e learn that certain specific conditions 

 of soil, food, and system are n^:essary for the development of 

 anthrax, and beyond the particular spots on which they are 

 generated, they do not pass by means of the atmosphere, breath 



'' Glos-anthrax is observed to appear in localities where foot-and-mouth disease 

 prevails ; and probaMy we may he justified in viewing this form of anthrax as the 

 result of a direct transmission of a l)lood poison in many iustances^even anthrax 

 poison it may be. 



