THE LUNG PLAGUE. 39 



marked symptoms, and still a large proportion of the animals had the peculiar cough so 

 well described by the French commission ; yet, to have neglected means to arrest the disease 

 would have resulted in many deaths. Before I was led to approve, as I do strongly, of 

 the practice of inoculation, and since, when there have been insuperable obstacles to its 

 adoption, I have placed all the herd, sometimes in the stable and at other times in the 

 open field, on regular daily doses of sulphate of iron, allowing about half a drachm or 

 a drachm to a bullock, mixed with a similar amount of bruised coriander seeds and 

 perhaps some bran, the better to disguise the iron. Thus mixed with fresh coriander 

 seeds, cattle will leave grass to eat the medicine, and I have uniformly found a mitigation 

 of the cough, a disappearance of the malady, and the herds have preserved an admirable 

 condition. 



I can confirm Sauberg s statement that it is dangerous to resort to active purgatives, and 

 the common symptom of constipation, even in the earlier stages of pleuropneumonia, can be 

 better corrected by diet and the administration of a stimulant, such as carbonate of ammo 

 nia, combined with warm water injections, than by any other plan. When the exudation 

 in the lung tissue is not checked, and in all cases where it has advanced too far to admit 

 of being checked by capillary astringents, it is, as a rule, desirable to leave animals entirely 

 to nature. 



The observation of many hundred cases within the past fifteen years has con 

 vinced me that, left entirely to themselves, when the malady has fairly developed, a 

 considerable proportion of the cattle affected in one lung recover, whereas nearly all 

 those affected on both sides die. The many methods of treatment recommended have 

 not seemed to increase the average of recoveries among cases of one-sided pleuro 

 pneumonia. 



It is extremely difficult to ascertain the conditions under which a small or a great 

 mortality may be anticipated. This may be gleaned from the observations of the French 

 commission. They found some animals which apparently resisted the disease. These 

 were doubtless latent cases, as they afterward resisted contagion. If this be admitted, the 

 mortality amounted to thirty per cent, of the animals affected, and this mortality is infi 

 nitely less than that observed frequently under circumstances w T hich would appear most 

 favorable to the health of cattle and their resistance to disease. 



It has been seen that, as far back as 1769, fumigations were recommended for the 

 treatment of pleuropneumonia. Of late years carbolic acid has been strongly recommended 

 .for this purpose, and may prove beneficial. Its internal administration failed many years 

 ago, when, under the name of creosote for much of our foreign creosote is carbolic 

 acid it was used especially by a distinguished English veterinarian, Mr. Charles Hunt 

 ing, of Fence Houses, near Durham. The employment of antiseptics comes properly under 

 the head of preventive measures, which are considered in a subsequent section of this 

 report. 



Notwithstanding the many authorities in favor of blisters, setons, rowels, and even 

 the hot iron, I must assert, from careful observation, that, in the acute stages of the dis 

 ease, they invariably aggravate the malady and sometimes kill. There are instances 

 which indicate the contrary, for, when examining cases in Pennsylvania, I was told by a 

 farmer that his cattle were dying, and he called in a professional man who blistered 

 severely and cured several. They would probably have recovered if left to nature, though 



