328 BLOOD DISEASE IN LAMBS. 



required in consequence of the excessive good condition of 

 a flock of ewes, it should consist in epsom salts to purge 

 them, or nitre to cool them. They will lick up nitre 

 greedily, and it is an admirable preservative. 



JOINT DISEASE AMONGST CALVES AND LAMBS. 



In conjunction with the blood disease already described, 

 and sometimes independently of any such affections, young 

 domestic ruminants suffer at, or immediately after, birth, 

 with a form of arthritis, dependent partly on a scrofulous 

 cachexia, but having most of the characters of a rheumatic 

 disease. This arthritic disease has been much on the in- 

 crease of late years, and especially amongst lambs. Mr 

 Eobertson, of Kelso,* who has studied this disease with his 

 usual care and intelligence, considers that its causes are con- 

 stitutional and local. The constitutional and predisposing 

 causes are a scrofulous and a rheumatic taint. Certain 

 exciting causes are essential to the development of the 

 disease, and "animals which have undoubtedly inherited 

 either a scrofulous or rheumatic diathesis may, under favour- 

 able conditions, escape being affected; while others, less 

 fortunately circumstanced, may fall victims, or, as in certain 

 cases, both these tendencies are associated in the same 

 animal/' 



Mr Robertson declares it as his opinion, that calves are 

 most frequently affected by true rheumatism. The animal 

 is seized when some weeks old, and it is observed to be 

 very lame. The pain experienced is evidently intense, and 

 general fever high. The temperature of the body is in- 

 creased, the visible mucous membranes injected, and the 

 pulse frequent and full. The appetite is capricious or lost. 



* See the Edinburgh Veterinary Review, vol. v. 1863, p. 529. 



