TEXAS CATTLE-DISEASE. 59 



and hence all such meat condemned, as it truly should be in 

 every case of this kind. The liver is also much congested 

 and enlarged, often twice its normal size, weighing from 

 twenty to thirty pounds. There is more or less softening, 

 and it is sometimes waxy. It is very yellow in color, and 

 occasionally a tinge of greenish black. The gall-bladder is 

 usually full of dark, viscid and flocculent bile. It contains 

 an abundance of granular flakes, which present a brilliant 

 appearance of transmuted light, and are characteristic of the 

 disease in question. 



There is more or less inflammation and erosion about the 

 stomach, especially in the fourth apartment, known as the 

 abomasum. This, with the upper portion of the bowel, is 

 often cono-ested and softened. The effects of this cono^estion 

 appear in a marked degree in all the Texan and Cherokee 

 cattle when slaughtered for beef in our Northern markets. 

 Hence it might be inferred that the meat was diseased also. 

 Yet we have no proof that any harm ever came from eating it. 

 But when we remember that the spleens of all the Southern 

 cattle are larger than those in our native stock, we should well 

 consider this whole matter in a sanitary point of view, before 

 adopting this class of cheap beef from such malarial districts 

 for our daily use. I would not condemn such meat as unfit 

 for food, yet I much prefer to have a home-made article. 

 The blood in this disease undergoes very important changes, 

 and there is even abundant evidence of the dissolution of its 

 proximate elements. The red corpuscles are perceptibly 

 modified in form and size, as well as wonderfully diminished 

 in quantity in the last stages of the malady. Hence the color- 

 iug matter is diffused all over the body, and appears in the 

 excretion from the kidneys. This constitutes the Hematuria, 

 "Red or Black Water," as the case may be, according to the 

 length of time the urine has been retained in the bladder. 

 Bile is always to be detected in the blood, and thus acts as the 

 solvent to these anatomical elements. Cholcemia, therefore, 

 exists, as is shown by the yellowish coloring matter found in 

 all the exudations that have taken place. This is well shown 

 beneath the skin, and in nearly all the internal organs. 



To diagnose this disease, the thermometer is universally 

 acknowledged to be the most valuable instrument that we 



