On Merino Sheep. 33 



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I. The ivcrm in the head did not come much into 

 notice, until the last summer, when a considerable alarm 

 was excited among merino-men by its discovery, but 

 their fears were chiefly groundless, for they are now 

 found to exist in a greater or less degree, in the heads of 

 almost all sheep, producing for the most part but little 

 inconvenience and very rarely death. Like the various 

 worms in the human body, especially those of children, 

 they probably become more troublesome when the ani- 

 mal is labouring under disease, when from our great igno- 

 rance of its nosology, suspicion is apt to light on them 

 as the cause. I have remarked, that it is only in chronic 

 affections where any appearances of inflammation attend 

 the retreat of the worms, and even then not in a sufficient 

 degree one would suppose, to endanger life: they pro- 

 bably subsist on the mucous secretions of the region in 

 which they exist, and if so, can produce but litde irrita- 

 tion. From the head of one ewe, which died during the 

 winter in consequence of lambing, I took twenty of these 

 worms: they were of various sizes, from an eighth to 

 three-fourths of an inch in length, and were all found in 

 the frontal sinuses, but without the smallest appearance of 

 inflammation in the parts. I have recently made a disco- 

 very which must render doubtful the theory of this 

 worm's origin. Having a lamb to die in consequence 

 of losing its mother, curiosity induced me to have it ex- 

 amined, and to my great astonishment this miraculous 

 worm, about a quarter of an inch in length, was found 

 snugly stowed away in his accustomed habitation. The 

 lamb was dropped about the first of February, and died 

 in the latter part of March. Can the worm in this case 

 be supposed to have originated from a fly or bee, when 

 from its size it might be supposed to be coeval with the 

 lamb itself? Or must we not rather conclude it to be one 



