150 FURUNCULAR ERUPTIONS. 



animals, and human beings are known to suffer much from 

 contact, direct or indirect, with animals affected with these 

 diseases. This is seen at seaport towns, where hides are 

 imported in quantities, and in manufactories, where hair is 

 worked up. Dr Laycock mentions, in his paper above 

 quoted, that, according to M. Trousseau, " in two factories at 

 Paris, where hair from Buenos Ay res is used, twenty persons 

 have died in about ten years from carbuncle, although only 

 six or eight were employed daily. Rayer saw several cases 

 of the disease while attached to the Hospital St Antoine, all 

 of which came from the same factory, and where hair from 

 Russia was worked up. It is more than probable, therefore/' 

 adds Dr Laycock, " that at least some of the worst cases of 

 carbuncle which have occurred in the United Kingdom have 

 been really due to direct contagion from imported fomites, 

 although we may not be justified in attributing all to this 

 source." Further on Dr Laycock says, "There is another 

 epizootic source of simple furuncle, which is worthy of men- 

 tion in this place. It is well known that the cavalry of 

 armies are particularly liable to suffer from furunculi. Ali- 

 bert mentions the case of a Cossack, upon whose nates and 

 lower extremities he counted above a hundred boils. The 

 sacral region is, in fact, specially the seat of them in cavalry 

 soldiers. But grooms and others, who have to work amongst 

 horses, are also peculiarly liable. It is not improbable, 

 therefore, that the materies morbi in cases of this kind is of 

 equine origin, and this class of furuncle is to be discriminated 

 at least aetiologically from the epidemic form." 



I shall have occasion elsewhere to notice the malignant 

 anthrax of animals and malignant pustule in man, and I 

 have only to add, that ordinary boils and carbuncles in 

 animals are treated in the early stage by poultices, fomenta- 

 tions and attention to the animal's general health, and in 



