Diseases. 155 



that birds suffering from this malady died in a rapid and 

 unaccountable manner, they could form no conception as to 

 the real cause or nature of the disease. A careful study of 

 the symptoms, together with a close watchfulness of the pro- 

 gress of the complaint, and a post-mortem examination of 

 birds which died from this cause, led me to the conclusion 

 that it was neither more nor less than typhus fever, and my 

 diagnosis proved to be correct. Since then several of my 

 friends and acquaintances have had a visitation of this direful 

 malady, and among others that enthusiastic and successful 

 exhibitor, Mr. Thos. Thompson, of Lancaster, then living at 

 Preston, in Lancashire. Mr. Thompson had a most unfortu- 

 nate and disheartening experience. At the time he had in 

 his possession probably the grandest lot of prize birds ever 

 owned by any fancier or combination of fanciers, and after 

 a most successful season, beating the Messrs. Mackley, G. E. 

 Russell, and all the best known and most successful exhi- 

 bitors of crests, he had the misfortune to purchase some 

 evenly-marked Yorkshire birds, which introduced the disease 

 into his bird-room, and in a few weeks he lost some hundreds 

 of pounds' worth of the grandest crests, mules, &c., that have 

 ever been produced or seen in the hands of any single man, 

 including most of his champion crests, that had never been 

 beaten. He sent for me, and I did all I could to save the 

 remainder of his stock, but the disease had got sach a hold 

 upon them that it was with the greatest difficulty that a few 

 of the best could be saved. This was in or about the year 

 1884. This misfortune caused him to suddenly relinquish the 

 fancy, and in losing him we lost one of the kindest, noblest, 

 and best of men that ever entered the arena as a canary 

 exhibitor. About 1888 or 1889, Mr. G. E. Russell, then living 

 at Brierley Hill, had a visitation of this scourge in his bird- 

 room, and that stayed his career as a successful exhibitor of 

 crested canaries. Many other fanciers of my acquaintance 

 have suffered similarly. 



Birds are most liable to this disorder when about to moult, 

 and more particularly young birds when changing their nest 



