314 Seventeenth Annual Report of the 



Fleming (1875) claimed in England a loss of 10 per cent. " in 

 those localities in which it was very severe." Brown said that 

 " in one dairy in London, 16 died out of 86." Brown's data of 

 18.37 per cent, are from the city of London where the cows never 

 breathed the pure air, never stood on a clean dry floor, but, on the 

 contrary, stood or lay day and night on a hard floor, and were 

 subjected to an unvarying forced feeding of sloppy diet to secure 

 the maximum yield of milk. Fleming is less specific, but claims 

 his 10 per cent, mortality only in restricted localities where the 

 disease was very severe. As a military veterinarian he, too, nat- 

 urally came in contact with the large city dairy, with its confined 

 and slop-fed cows, a condition which has no parallel in the average 

 country herd. Friedberger and Frolmer are quoted to the effect 

 that "sometimes the character of the disease is so malignant that 

 5 to 50 per cent, of adult animals die." And, again, " in some 

 years this usually benign disease has assumed a very malignant 

 type." It is evident, from even these authors, that the high mor- 

 tality is very exceptional, whether occurring under special un- 

 hygienic conditions in limited areas or in given years only in con- 

 nection with an unusual potency of the germ, susceptibility of the 

 stock exposed, or complexity of the infection. Is it reasonable or 

 economical, then, to apply universally to the benign epizootics, 

 which constitute the vast majority, that sweeping destruction which 

 may lie most desirable in the very exceptional outbreak, local, or 

 general ? Anyone who has had an extended acquaintance with 

 this disease in the Old World, where alone such experience has 

 been hitherto possible, knows that, apart from sucklings and an 

 extraordinarily bad environment, deaths were practically unknown 

 and recoveries were regular and perfect. I have already quoted 

 the statistics of the Live Stock Insurance Association, covering a 

 long series of years when aphthous fever was rampanj in Great 

 Britain and showing in the face of many thousands of deaths from 

 other affections not one single death from foot and month disease. 

 Worse than Procrustes, who merely racked out the dwarf to fit 

 his bed and cut down the giant to i(s dimensions, this merciless 

 rule sacrifices all, tall, short and medium alike, no matter how 

 well adapted to the couch in the natural condition. 



