REPORT OF THE BUREAU OF ANIMAL INDUSTRY. 49 



here affected animals have been frequently taken into Maryland and 

 Virginia, scattering the disease and causing severe losses in those 

 States. The presence of such a pest, dangerous not only to the equine 

 race but equally fatal to mankind, calls for energetic measures of sup- 

 pression. To this end prompt action has been taken whenever the 

 disease has been discovered, and affected animals have been killed 

 as soon as possible after a satisfactory diagnosis was reached. At 

 the same time great care has been exercised that no animals should 

 be condemned unless they presented the pathognomonic evidences of 

 the affection. When practicable a post-mo rtem examination is always 

 made to confirm the ante-mortem diagnosis. The number of horses 

 killed in the District of Columbia because affected with glanders 

 was : July, 1; August, 0; September, 2 ; October, 10; November, 1; 

 December, 12; total, 26. 



THE ETIOLOGY AND DIAGNOSIS OF GLANDERS. 



Glanders is a contagious disease of importance, both from an eco- 

 nomical and sanitary stand-point. It is not only communicated from 

 one horse to another, but it is occasionally transmitted to man, pro- 

 ducing a severe and generally fatal disease. 



The consensus of opinion and of legislation to-day demands the 

 slaughter of animals affected with glanders. Recovery of horses 

 affected with this disease is perhaps never complete. In the great 

 majority of cases it runs a course of variable length, the final result 

 of which is death preceded by emaciation and general debility. Nor 

 is there any remedy or cure for the disease. Granted even t}ie pos- 

 sibility of recovery, the affected animal is in the meantime a source 

 of continual danger to other horses and to human beings. It is 

 therefore in the end economy to immediately destroy glandered horses 

 when detected, even were human life not endangered by their pres- 

 ence. 



But the diagnosis of glanders is not always an easy matter. It 

 may be confounded with a number of other diseases, and when a 

 very valuable animal is involved an accurate diagnosis is of great 

 importance. Since the discovery of the bacillus of glanders in 1882 

 considerable attention has been paid to the matter of diagnosis, and 

 we are in a position to-day to present a few valuable facts in this 

 connection. In the following pages some space will be devoted to 

 the consideration of the causation or etiology of the disease, with 

 special reference to the specific bacillus and its biology, a brief ac- 

 count of experiments made both in our own laboratory and else- 

 where to facilitate diagnosis. 



ETIOLOGY. 



The communicable nature of the disease among horses known as 

 glanders and farcy is^ now thoroughly established by experiments, 

 which have revealed its cause as a micro-organism belonging to the 

 group of bacilli. These experiments date from the year 1882. The 

 contagious character was, however, recognized long before this time 

 and various ^experimenters had succeeded in producing the disease 

 in horses ana other animals by inoculating with the nasal discharges 

 and other pathological products of the disease. In Germany the 

 real character of glanders was re'cognized as far back as the first 

 quarter of the present century. In France, however, there was a 

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