No. 6. DEPARTMENT OF AGRICULTURE. 109 



septicemia and the losses will then cease. In the case where vaccine 

 has been used these losses have been sustained at the time the injec- 

 tions were made and it is liard to determine whether the vaccine 

 should be ^iven creu't for checking the outbreak. For the vaccina- 

 tion against hemorrhage. ^ septicemia to be of practical value it should 

 be administered to all exjj.^sed animals at the time the first case is 

 diagnosed. To date we have nr»t been able to accomplish this because 

 a diagnosis is seldom established until one or more animals have died 

 and then, by the time the case is reported, the vaccine prepared and 

 administered, the normal number of cases will have been lost and the 

 balance of the animals may not contract the disease if not vaccinated. 

 The following is a statement of the vaccinations made during the 

 past year in two herds: 



Total number of cattle, 206 



Number dead prior to vaccination, 32 



Number vaccinated, 174 



Number sick at time of vaccination, 3 



Number dead following vaccination, 5 



FOOT-AND-MOUTH DISEASE 



Foot-and-mouth disease is one of the most highly transmissible dis- 

 eases of all ruminants and cloven-footed animals. It has been pro- 

 duced artiflcally and by contact in mary other domestic and wild 

 animals. Like smallpox, scarlet fever and a few other well known 

 transmissible diseases of human beings, the true cause of foot-and- 

 mouth disease has never been recognized. The best authorities con- 

 sider that it is due to an organism which is so small that it cannot be 

 seen by the highest power microscope and that it will pass through 

 the finest filter. It usually runs a characteristic non-fatal course 

 whether treated or not. The disease has existed in Asia for cen- 

 turies, or since any record has been kept of the diseases of livestock. 

 Within the past two hundred years it has caused most extensive 

 losses in cattle, sheep and hogs in practically all countries where 

 such animals are raised. Germany lost an average of |1, 000,000 per 

 year for the sixteen years from 1886 to 1902. In 1802 her losses were 

 over 14,000,000. France sustained a loss of |7,500,000. in 1871 and 

 England |5.000,000 in 1883. In nearly all countries of Continental 

 Europe it is more dreaded than any other animal plague. North 

 America has been especially fortunate so far as foot-and-mouth dis- 

 ease is concerned. The first case recorded in this country appeared 

 in Montreal, in 1870, in a shipment of cattle imported from Eng- 

 land. It spread from Montreal to Quebec, Ontario, Central and 

 Eastern New York, New Jersey and all the New England States. 



There are a few unauthenticated outbreaks recorded in various 

 parts of the country. One for instance Vi Pennsylvania in 1888. 

 This occurred in a shipment of Guernsey cattle imported by Mark 

 Hughes and Samuel Kent, of Oxford, I*a. These cattle landed in 

 Baltimore in 1888 and were sick upon arrivjl. The late Dr. Francis 

 Bridge, of Philadelphia, who was familiar with the disease in Scotland 

 was called to see these animals and pronounced it foot-and-moutli 

 disease. At that time the Federal Government permitted the owner 

 to take the animals to a place satisfactory to the Government and 



