SPREAD OF PLEUROPNEUMONIA. 39 



called pleuro-pneumonia, the most dangerous and most ter- 

 rible of all our cattle-diseases, was stamped out absolutely 

 in this State quite a number of years ago ; but it. still exists 

 in this country, and, while it exists, it is a standing menace, 

 not only to the cattle-owners of our own State, but to the 

 great cattle-interests of the whole country. It exists just 

 now, in at least five different States and in the District of 

 Columbia. I believe there is no doubt that it exists in New 

 York, New Jersey, in portions of Pennsylvania, in Delaware, 

 in Maryland, and in the District of Columbia. 



Now, while I wish to bring this matter up, I do not wish 

 to bring it up to create any discussion, or cause any loss of 

 time ; but I wish every farmer to realize the fact, that unless 

 we take steps, unless Congress take steps, to stamp it out ab- 

 solutely, we are going to have the same trouble in this country 

 which they have had in England for the last thirty years. 

 England is paying something like two millions of pounds a 

 year (ten millions of dollars) in a vain struggle against con- 

 tagious diseases, of which pleuro-pneumonia is the worst. 

 It is the worst, because it is the most insidious, because the 

 period of incubation is so long. It is worse than the rinder- 

 pest, or cattle-plague, — a thousand times more to be feared 

 by us, — because the period of incubation is so long. The 

 period of incubation of the rinderpest, or cattle-plague, of th£ 

 East, is not more than six days at the outside; so that, if an 

 animal is exposed to that disease in Liverpool, and is shipped 

 at once to this country, she must be dead, in ninety-five or 

 ninety-nine cases out of a hundred, inevitably, before she 

 can arrive in this country. But it is not so with the pleuro- 

 pneumonia. An animal may be exposed to the pleuro-pneu- 

 monia to-day, and no mortal living can tell under forty days 

 at least, and from that to eighty or ninety days, whether 

 she is going to have the pleuro-pneumonia or not. Our ex- 

 perience in this State shows, that, of all the animals that are 

 exposed to that disease, twenty-five per cent will take it and 

 die. Another twenty-five per cent will take it, and just 

 graze through ; but the effects of the disease will never leave 

 the system. There will be a large encysted mass or a dis- 

 eased portion of the lung ; and whenever that animal is 

 killed, no matter whether it is five or ten years hence, that 

 great mass of putrid corruption will be found there. An- 



