Report on Steppe Murrain or Rinderpest. 243 



ascertained that the outbreak also in these instances depended 

 upon the introduction of six steppe cattle bought at the same 

 fair. 



Characters of the Disease. 



Infection. — Rinderpest properly belongs to that class of dis- 

 eases which are denominated special or specific ; by which we 

 understand that there is either some certain and particular cause 

 which gives origin to them, or that a marked peculiarity attends 

 their progress and results. Affections of this kind most fre- 

 quently possess the power of extension by an inherent property 

 of disseminating the materies morhi upon which they themselves 

 depend, and which we recognise by the terms infection and con- 

 tagion. Thus each victim may be viewed as adding new seeds 

 to the malady by the exhalations arising from its own body ; it 

 being a remarkable circumstance that when the morbific matter 

 has entered the system, it multiplies to an inconceivable extent 

 before it is cast out by the organic functions. The circum- 

 stance of animals when in health contracting a disease of the 

 same description as that affecting others with which they aie 

 located is the best proof of the infectious or contagious nature of 

 the malady. The escape of some under the same circumstances 

 may be due to a variety of causes, and offers no satisfactory 

 proof that the disease is wo/z-contagious. For example, all ani- 

 mals are not equally susceptible of being acted on at the same 

 time by the morbific matter ; some may, therefore, resist its 

 influence to-day, but in the course of a few days afterwards be 

 susceptible of its action. 



Tlie facts which have been given with reference to the various 

 outbreaks of the rinderpest do not require the addition of scien- 

 tific deductions to establish more firmly the infectious nature of 

 the malady. We believe that it stands second to none in its 

 capability of spreading from animal to animal, the cattle tribe 

 heing alone its victims. If the malady were one that owed its 

 extension to unexplained causes ; if it suddenly showed itself in 

 one part of the Continent, and rapidly spread, despite all pre- 

 cautionary measures and without the introduction of diseased 

 animals, to others near to or at a greater distance from its origin ; 

 if, in short, it possessed all the cliaracters of an epizootic ; then 

 we might have some reason to doubt its infectious nature. 



It has been stated on indisputable authority that any animal 

 which has been exposed to the infection can propagate the dis- 

 ease without itself becoming affected ; and that even cattle can 

 do this before they are so, in consequence of the materies morbi 

 beins: lodsred in the hair which covers their bodies. This is 



