THE LUNG PLAGUE OF CATTLE. 99 



way :'. feet wide behind the cows. llebnvs fresh rmvs in Illinois ami sells fat ones to 

 t he butcher. 



\a vier Wieget. Coin nl n is avenue, has .">tle<>\\ s. \\ liieli were healthy, and states that, 

 not one cow has died in five years. This is also a liriek st aide, arranged similar to 

 the others, and is well lighted and ventilated. A small t'eneed yard joins t lie st a hie, 

 into \\ hieh t he eo\\ s are turned in line \\ eat her tor exercise. 



Hermon Kropper. K'osette >treet, has 7 cows, that \\ere healthy, and stales that, 

 lint one had died from his herd this season ; none of the others were sick. 



Frank Rempsberger has >> cows in one staMe that \\aswell lighted, though not, 

 Sufficiently ventilated. These rows remain tied in their places from the time they 

 come iii fresh until they u'et fat and are sold to the luitcher. It was stated that this 

 Season none had died, though it is not uncommon in some years for t wo or throe to 

 die. The cows were all healthy. The drainage was into a Newer. 



Fresh cows arc bought of cow dealers, two or three at a time, as they are needed lo 

 keep up the supply of milk. As is the practice with the other dairymen I visited, 

 distillery slop is run into troughs in front of the cattle and they drink it; brewers' 

 grains and wheat bran are mixed together and given them, and iu addition hay is fed 

 to them. 



On Manchester road are some stock-yards which were formerly used by the Missouri 

 Pacific Railroad, but now the railroad does not laud stock, and the yards are used by 

 cow dealers and butchers to keep their cattle in. 



H. Bischotr. a butcher who has a slaughter-house in these yards and who kills from 

 f)i to 75 cattle per week, stated that in the cattle he killed the lungs showed less 

 signs of disease than any other of the internal organs. He also stated that several 

 years ago, when the milkmen's cows were dying in great numbers, that he opened 

 several ot them and found the heart, liver, and spleen enlarged, the urine bloody, and 

 the fat very yellow. The lungs were not affected. From this description it appears 

 evident that t he disease was Texas fever. 



In the yards were a herd of about 25 steers which Mr. Bischoff said he was in the 

 habit of herding upon the commons during the day and they were driven into the 

 yards at night. One can readily see how this practice would spread the malady from 

 cows grazing over the same ground with steers. 



Several cow dealers said the only diseases they had seen among cows was dry mur- 

 rain and bloody murrain. From the bloody appearance of the urine iu Texas fever, 

 it is obvious that this disease was meant by the latter name. 



The Saint Louis Union stock-yards, situated on the Saint Louis side of the river, is 

 also a large cattle market. For 1830 the receipts of cattle were 112,920 head; ship- 

 ments, 16,480. 



W. A. Ramsey, superintendent, stated that the only disease among cattle here was 

 Texas fever, and that this year there had been less than ever of that disease. The 

 cause of its becoming less and less each year, he thought, was due to the fact that the 

 rattle in Texas were becoming more domesticated. Large numbers of wellbred bulls 

 wen- taken into the State every year and had greatly improved the grade of cattle. 

 A greater amount of land is being cultivated, which changes the character of the 

 herbage and may have some influence in preventing the disease. The number of 

 deaths was greatest in 1S7(> from Texas fever. He stated that there was but very 

 little trade in eastern dairy calves; the majority of that stock goes to Chicago mar- 

 ket and is distributed from there. 



Mr. Pegram, a cattle dealer, said there bad been less than a dozen loads of eastern 

 dairy calves shipped through these yards this season. He had not seen a singlesteer 

 die ot' Texas fever in the yards this season. On account of this disease farmers for 

 \vh >m he does business would not receive " stockers," i. e., young cattle to be fattened 

 by them during the warm summer months, because they would die in large numbers 

 on reaching their farms. This season, however, he had bought and shipped stockers 

 daring July and August, and had no trouble about cattle dying; which was pretty 

 good evidence that the disease was not so prevalent as in former years. He said that 

 no cattle here were affected with lung plague. 



W. S. Hensley, another cattle dealer, said he had never seen a case of lung plague, 

 in the yards or" any where else; does not know what the disease is. Had not seen 

 three steers sick with Texas fever this season. Other years numbers of cattle had 

 died from it, but it was becoming less and less prevalent each year, dii", he thought, 

 to the better breeding of cattle in Texas. 



The experience and statements of other cattle dealers was essentially the same as 

 that of those given. 



The cattle in the yards and those in slaughter-houses near by were healthy. There 

 are no commons around the yards. 



John Crowley. veterinary surgeon, said he had not seen any eas^s of lung plague 

 since c uning to tin- United States, either in his practice in Saint Louis or in Spring- 

 field, 111., where he had practiced for a number of years before coming to Saint Louis. 



I examined the cows of Arnold Steinlager, Prarie avenue, who keeps 60 head. Not 



