22 



course, when tlie dogs killed them they too contracted the 

 disease. AYith regard to the dogs, he was convinced that if 

 he could not find 40 per cent, unaffected in Adelaide, the 

 percentage diseased would be 60 or even more in the South- 

 East. 



SUPPLEMEiS^T. 



[Read March 6, 1883.] 



[Dr. Thomas, at a subsequent date, after a personal inspec- 

 tion of the South-Eastern portion of South Australia, the 

 western district of A^ictoria, and the City of Melbourne, made 

 the following additional remarks as the result of his observa- 

 tions: — ] 



As regards our colony, my investigations were principally 

 made in two directions : — First, as to the alleged prevalence of 

 hydatid disease in man and the lower animals in the South- 

 East ; and, secondly, as regards the occurrence of the adult 

 tapeworm in the dogs there. Upon the first of these points the 

 records of the Mount G-ambier Hospital and the experience of 

 the medical men practising in the various towns supplied me 

 with valuable information, and I shall in the first place com- 

 municate that to you. From questions put to medical men 

 practising at Kingston, Millicent, and Mount G-ambier, I was 

 informed that hydatids were extremely common in their several 

 practices, and it appeared that the part of the country most 

 liable to this disease was, roughly speaking, a triangular dis- 

 trict, which was bounded on the north by the line of railway 

 from Kingston to Xarracoorte ; on the east by a line drawn 

 from ^N'arracoorte to MacDonnell Bay ; and on the west by the 

 coast line. Of course it is not meant that this is the only 

 infected part, but merely that in a rough-and-ready way this 

 marks the worst part of the country. And it appears, too, that 

 kangaroo and domestic animals suffer more from hydatids here 

 than elsewhere. Of course during a brief sojourn in these parts 

 it was impossible for me to authenticate these statements for 

 myself, but I am quite willing to believe them. I must say, how- 

 ever, that at Benara Station, near Mount Gambler, where alone 

 I had the opportunity of examining about half a dozen brush- 

 kangaroos, I failed to find in any single instance any hydatids, 

 either in the lungs or other viscera of the animals ; and the 

 same remark applies to eight brush-kangaroos examined on the 

 opposite side of the Victorian frontier at the Punt. This, 

 however, proves but little, for at the Punt there is an abundant 

 supply of drinking water in the beautiful G-lenelg Eiver, and 



