296 The 'Book of the Coat. 



It is not within my province to describe the clinical 

 symptoms or other technical details of this febrile 

 complaint, but I may state briefly that, as regards the 

 human subject, it is an intermittent, or mostly inter- 

 mittent, fever resembling enteric. The patient may be 

 comparatively well in the morning, and in the evening 

 show a temperature of 103 or 104 degrees, whilst the next 

 morning his condition may be again normal, the disease 

 extending over long periods, such as three or four months. 

 As to the goats, one of the most striking observations 

 recorded was the healthy appearance of the majority of 

 those infected. We read that " the animals were sleek 

 and plump, with smooth, healthy-looking coats ; they took 

 their food well, were as active as their uninfected fellows, 

 and yielded as large a quantity of milk, and of apparently 

 as good a quality. ... In many instances the infected 

 milch goats were the best-looking and the best milkers in 

 the herd, and in a few- instances only it was noted that 

 an infected animal suffered from a short, barking cough 

 at infrequent intervals." This disease is, it seems, no new 

 discovery, having been known and studied from very early 

 times, and having been described by Hippocrates. It is 

 due to a microbe known as Micrococcus melitensis, which 

 h^s been shown by various observers to be present in vast 

 numbers in the blood and, as a consequence, in the milk 

 of the goat. 



Origin and Distribution of the "Disease. 



Dr. Eyre is of opinion that " Melitensis septiccemia 

 [Mediterranean Fever] is primarily a disease of the goat 

 which had its origin in the Persian hills [the Persian wild 

 goat, Capra cegagrus], and which accompanied that goat 

 on its world-wide wanderings, remaining potentially active 

 for man so long as its host preserved its original habits 

 in barren rocky countries in the tropics and sub-tropics, 



