MEASLES. 227 



measles has been most erroneously applied to two diseases of 

 the pig the one being a parasitic malady due to the exist- 

 ence of cysticerci in the muscular system of the hog; and 

 the other, a disease of the blood, usually associated with severe 

 gastro-intestinal derangement, and well known as the ' blue 

 disease,' or hog cholera. German veterinarians have furnished 

 us with histories of outbreaks of a contagious fever amongst 

 sheep and swine, which is probably the same disease as 

 human rubeola. It is not known whether it is one and the 

 same disease in man and these animals, or whether it is 

 transmissible from animals of one species to those of another. 

 The definitions of the disease given by continental veterinary 

 surgeons is in substance the same as the above, quoted from 

 Dr Wood's "Practice of Medicine," and which might well 

 stand for a translation of the following definition by Professor 

 Hering : " Fieber, mit catarrhalischen Zufallen und einem 

 unregelmassigen Ausschlag (Entziindung und Knotchen) auf 

 der Haut verbunden. Acuter verlauf, ansteckend." 



Ryss a German veterinarian seems the first to have 

 described the disease as he witnessed it in a flock of sheep in 

 1811. In addition to the symptoms of a slight irritative 

 fever, he observed that the animals sneezed, coughed, had a 

 discharge from the nose, swelling of the head, especially in 

 the parotid region, heat of mouth, dryness of skin, want of 

 appetite, and constipation. Towards the end of the second 

 day a reddish eruption rose over the chest, then on the thighs, 

 sides of the body, face, &c. The eruption had the character 

 of irregular red spots, which became white on pressure with 

 the finger, and in the centre of which a hardness was felt, so 

 as to give to the skin an uneven feeling when the hand was 

 passed over it. Twenty-four hours were required for the 

 development of the eruption. The cutaneous secretions had 

 a peculiar odour, and after the eruption was well out the 



