106 THE DISEASES OF DOMESTIC ANIMALS. 



Etiology. 



Our studies have led us to the conclusion that anthrax is an 

 acute infectious disease due to the action of specific germs called 

 bacteria. The disease very frequently assumes an enzootic or epi- 

 zootic form, although it is frequently sporadic in its aj)pearance and 

 occurs mostly in grazing animals and swine, but is also transmissi- 

 ble to man. 



The nature of the earth plays no unimportant part in enzootic 

 outbreaks of the disease. The disease is found most frequently in 

 localities where the earth contains much moisture, and in regions 

 where the rivers, brooks, or swamps are subject to drying out ; in 

 fact, in just such districts where intermittent fever prevails among 

 men. 



In many regions, such places become generally known as in- 

 fected districts, and are either fenced off or the animals kept from 

 grazing upon them, or they have been turned to cultivation, which 

 has led to the manifest decrease of the disease. Such regions are 

 especially frequent in the Bavarian Alps, where I studied the dis- 

 ease under the guidance of Professor Feser, of the Munich Veteri- 

 nary School. One is surprised that such infected localities are often 

 to be found at the very tops of the mountains or upon highly situ- 

 ated levels. 



An undue degree of moisture in the earth seems to favor the 

 development of the bacteria. 



While there is much similarity in the telluric nature of regions 

 where anthrax and intermittent fever prevail, it is not in accordance 

 with practical experience that both diseases should prevail in them, 

 for we find the one where the other does not appear, and vice versa. 

 "While anthrax is a disease, the generation of which seems so largely 

 dependent on the nature of the ground, it is by no means a malarial 

 disease. It never prevails to any such extent as intermittent fever, 

 even in regions where it appears, and which offer every condition 

 favorable to its development. 



The presence of the peculiar infectious elements is always ne- 

 cessary to the generation of the disease, no matter how favorable 

 the telluric conditions may appear to their development. 



My friend Dr. Oemler reduced an annual loss of twenty-one 

 per cent among the sheep of his district in Germany to two per 

 cent by energetic opposition to the burial of all cadavers of animals 

 that had died from the disease. Similar results have followed a 

 like procedure on the part of numerous other competent observers. 



