TUBERCULAR DISEASE. 211 



with tubercular disease at once destroyed. All meat 

 offered for sale should first be examined by experts. 

 And lastly, all animal food, from whatever source, 

 should be properly and sufficiently cooked. A high 

 temperature kills the bacillus, and the danger of in- 

 fection from diseased meat might be greatly reduced 

 if all animal food were properly cooked. 



The tubercle bacillus attacks most animals whose 

 bodily temperature favours its growth. It is common 

 in beasts and birds, and has even been found in 

 reptiles, but the temperature of these latter is not, 

 under ordinary circumstances, sufficiently high for its 

 growth. As I have said, it is extremely common in 

 the ox, though why it should, has not yet been ex- 

 plained. It is the cause of death in the majority of 

 monkeys, elephants, lions, tigers, and other wild 

 animals and birds held in captivity. These animals 

 being robbed of their natural exercise in the open air, 

 too often huddled together in unhealthy pens or cages, 

 and poorly or improperly fed, often doubtless upon 

 tuberculous flesh, become broken in health, and so 

 devitalised that they fall easy victims to the disease 

 germs, just as man does under like conditions. 



In quadrumana the disease runs the same course 

 as in man ; but in other animals, mammals and birds, 

 its course is often so very different, that it is only 

 the presence of the micro-organism which proves the 

 identity of the diseased conditions. 



It attacks some animals much more frequently than 

 others. Thus it is very common in the ox, and very 



