February, '16] MOORE: FUMIGATING ANIMALS 73. 



tomS; not being noticed for a few hours, are vividness of the face, bkiish 

 nails, feeble pulse, cold skin, giddiness, vomiting, and coma, sometimes 

 complicated by convulsions, and finally death. If death is not prompt, 

 jaundice may ensue. He states that symptoms similar to that of 

 hydrocyanic acid poisoning has been induced by inhaling vapor in the 

 industries where nitrobenzene is used. In order to ascertain exactly 

 how poisonous nitrobenzene would be to animals, a large white rat 

 was placed in a fumigation box of about six cubic feet and a drop of 

 nitrobenzene to each cubic foot evaporated therein, the rat being ex- 

 posed for a period of one hour. No sjanptoms of poisoning were 

 noticed at the time the rat was removed nor later. Another rat was 

 fumigated for three hours at the same rate without disastrous results. 

 The dose was increased to four, then 24 and finally 40 drops per cubic 

 foot for the same time without injury to the animal. It was then 

 found that more nitrobenzene was used than could be contained in the 

 air, the surplus condensing on the sides of the box. It was discovered 

 that about two to three drops of nitrobenzene would saturate a cubic 

 foot of air, making allowance for some to be absorbed by the wood of 

 the sides and bottom. The next question was to determine how long 

 the rat could live in the saturated air. A rat was placed in a larger 

 fumigation box containing about 180 cubic feet. Sufficient nitroben- 

 zene was evaporated to saturate the atmosphere and food was placed 

 in the box. The rat was alive and active at the end of 24 hours, when 

 he was noticed eating the food in the box. At 36 hours, the rat was 

 alive but somewhat sluggish and at the end of 48 hours, he died. The 

 experiment is not conclusive as the rat was forced to eat food which 

 probably contained nitrobenzene. Also the lack of oxygen may have 

 affected the results. 



Fumigation with Niteobenzene 

 The question immediately arose — If nitrobenzene is no more poison- 

 ous than here cited to higher animals, but is poisonous to the insects, 

 why not fumigate thQ animals to kill their parasites? It was found 

 that if a dog was placed in a fumigation box and sufficient nitrobenzene 

 introduced to saturate the atmosphere, the fleas would leave the dog in 

 about a half-hour and would be quite dead at the end of an hour and 

 a half. A dog thus treated showed no signs whatever of injury. Ex- 

 periments were conducted with hogs infested with lice and it was found 

 that a longer exposure was necessary to kill the Hce, six to eight hours 

 being necessary to completely free the hog of lice. In this case, also^ 

 most of the insects left the animal before dying. No effects of poison- 

 ing were discovered. A cross-bred sheep with a very thick dense wool 

 was next tried. An exposure of twelve hours removed about 90 per 



