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of four or five every da3^ He thereupon immediately 

 sent one of the defunct to a gentleman enjoying 

 some reputation, who after making an examination 

 pronounced the cause of death to be " tuberculosis." 

 The unfortunate owner then appealed to another 

 " specialist," who visited him, examined such of the 

 birds as were then alive, and said the disease was 

 "diphtheria " f This gentleman also prescribed a 

 remedy, (which b}^ the way is of no earthly use even 

 in real cases of diphtheria), and left the premises. As 

 might be expected this antiquated and wonderful 

 nostrum had no effect whatever save doubtless that of 

 worrying the poor sick birds, and so they continued to 

 die. In despair the owner then applied for help to me 

 and in one parcel sent me six birds that had died that 

 same day. His letter which accompanied the bodies 

 informed me that during the ten da3\s or so that had 

 elapsed since the outbreak of the disease lie had lost 

 half his birds, and that they had all died after about 

 two days illness. On careful examination I found, 

 what might not unreasonably have been expected 

 from the account of the illness coupled with the well 

 nourished condition of the bodies, that the disease 

 was certainly not Tuberculosis. Neither was it Diph- 

 theria, though for this mistake there was certainly 

 more excuse, since there were in the throats of most 

 of the birds some yellow deposits which to an un- 

 educated and naked eye might have conve3'ed a wrong 

 impression. 



During the next few days lie sent me further 

 supplies of dead birds, and all of them I found to 

 have died of the same disease as the earlier ones — 

 Septic Fever, in other words acute epizootic Septi- 

 caemia. One of the later bodies, — by this time he 

 had only about a dozen left out of the original eighty 

 — was brought to me b}^ his son, a very intelligent 

 and well educated youth, and I was able during the 



