310 MODERN FARRIER. 



several histories that have been given of the dis- 

 order, it appears to have differed in its symptoms 

 and effects, according to the countries in which it 

 appeared, the various seasons in which it commenced 

 its ravages, and some other circumstance not fully 

 ascertained. There seems to have been no doubt 

 that the disease was infectious, or at least that it 

 was easily propagated among the species of animals 

 which it attacked : but it does not appear to have 

 been capable of spreading to other species ; as men, 

 horses, sheep, and dogs, that lived in the neighbour- 

 hood of the infected cattle, shewed no marks of 

 having received the contagion. Nineteen out of 

 twenty cattle attacked by this disease are said, by 

 M. Sauvages to have died. 



Symptoms. — The following is Dr. Brocklesby's 

 account of this disease. For ten days or a fortnight 

 the cattle vrere troubled with a dry cough, which is 

 indeed not an uncommon symptom among cattle at 

 the close of a severe winter, and therefore Dr. Broc- 

 klesby did not consider it belonging to the present 

 disease : the hair was rougher on their skin than or- 

 dinary ; their eyes looked heavy, and, when the prin- 

 cipal disorder appeared, they refused fodder, but had 

 an insatiable thirst for a time. The milch-cows de- 

 creased in their milk, which remained to a certain 

 quantity, sometimes for two days, before it changed 

 colour, but at length often dried up. Upon ceasing 

 to chew the cud, a shivering seized them all over, 

 and a high fever immediately came on ; the milk, if 

 any remained to that time, curdled over the fire, 

 but did not in the first of the disorder. At first the 

 belly Avas costive, but for the ^ost part a looseness 

 succeeded within forty-eight hours after the shiver- 

 ing fit. Tlie stools were first green and watery 

 and of a stinking smell ; their consistence, however, 

 altered afterwards to a viscid, slimy matter, the 

 purging accompanied till about the seventh day 

 and about that time the excrements became thicker^, 



