184 PREVENTION AND TREATMENT OF SCABIES. 



professional men encourage when they bleed as a means of 

 purifying the blood. 



Whilst on this subject, it is proper to refer to the manage- 

 ment of markets and to the transmission of diseased animals 

 by railways. Firstly, with regard to the markets, it would 

 be well to substitute iron pens for the wooden enclosures at 

 present employed. Wood splinters, and portions of fleeces 

 especially from scabby sheep are entangled, and remain ad- 

 herent from market day to market day, being admirable 

 nests for the ova, whence living parasites crawl on to any 

 sheep approaching them. After each market the enclosures 

 should be thoroughly washed. This practice would entail a 

 slight expense, but it is essential for the prevention of disease. 

 It is desirable that the washing should be combined with the 

 use of materials destructive to parasites, and the best for 

 such a purpose would be soda in abundance, and impure 

 carbolic acid, such as is used in London for the destruction 

 of carcases condemned as unfit for human food. In addition 

 to these very necessary precautions, it is all-important that 

 scabby sheep should be seized and not allowed to be exposed 

 in markets. In fact, all farmers having scabby sheep should 

 be compelled to report the same, as they had to do when their 

 flocks had the small-pox, and the disease would then be 

 extirpated. It is quite possible to organise such a system 

 that scabby flocks should be effectually cured, and not 

 allowed to travel about and contaminate healthy animals. 

 Such a system would save many thousands sterling annually 

 to the United Kingdom. 



With regard more particularly to railway trucks, it is pro- 

 bable that in the course of time sanitary inspectors may be 

 found necessary to attend to the health of travelling stock. 

 This is a plan in favour abroad, and which I have no doubt will 

 be speedily introduced in some parts of Germany; but, in its 



". 



