50 BRITISH HUSBAXDRY. [Ch. XXXIX. 



more prevalent on dry pasture, containing heath and fern, than in the low- 

 lands. The animal, when attacked, is restless, the eye is red and watery, 

 the back raised while the liead is bent downwards, and he moves with evi- 

 ient pain. Bleeding — which may be promptly eiTected bv cuttinsr the tail 

 — is perhaps the most efficient check, as Sir George Mackenzie states 

 several instances in his " Mountain Shepherd's Manual," of its immediate 

 restoration of sheep on which it had been performed ; and that, taking an 

 verage of those which had been affected, three out of five were saved. 

 Glauber salts, or castor oil, should, however, be administered, and the 

 sheep should be put upon turnips during the day, with a dry-yard or littered 

 fold during the night, 



Tlie blood is a term given to a disorder by which sheep fed upon rich 

 pastures are not uncommonly attacked, and to which the flocks of the clay- 

 land graziers, and those in Romney Marsh, are peculiarly subject. In 

 Leicestershire tlie disease is called " the vellows," from the flesh after 

 death becoming yellow, and it frequentlv occurs among sheep feeding upon 

 red-clover while it is in blossom. The sheep are observed to separate them- 

 selves from the rest of the flock, they stand as if in pain, and stretch out 

 the fore-le^s in order to ease themselves ; their eyes appear heavy, they 

 fetch their breath short, and the abdomen seems convulsed. It is a malady 

 of the inflammatory kind, proving suddenly fatal ; analogous to that of 

 Braxy, and the remedies are similar. 



The ^ux, or scoj/rZ/i"-, evidently proceeds from cold and wet, or from 

 sheep of a weakly constitution being first put upon poor watery food, and 

 afterwards removed to rich pasture. It is, however, so far from being fatal, 

 that many graziers deem it salutary, and remark " that sheep fatten more 

 quickly after it." If long continued it may, however, prove injurious, and 

 if arising from wet, the sheep should be inunediately removed to a dry 

 situation, and supplied with sound hay ; but if occasioned by their rem.ovai 

 to rich land, they should then be put upon good short grass, and a little 

 corn may be given with good effect : they should also be kept from ponds, 

 and chalk should be put in the water which they drink. If the purging 

 become violent, a drachm of rhubarb may be infused in half a pint of 

 warmed milk ; and if tliat should not stop it, a few drops of laudanum may 

 be added on a repetition of tlie dose ; or the medicine known as the 

 "sheep's cordial" may be safely used. 



Young lambs are very frequently attacked by it, under the name of the gall, 

 at that season of the year when the grass is springing, for they begin to 

 eat it when a fortnight or three weeks old, and after a few warm showers, 

 some of them occasionally die. This it is very difficult to prevent, as they 

 are then with the ewes, the food of which cannot be often conveniently 

 changed. If older, although hay would then be desirable, they are then 

 not easily induced to eat it; they should therefore have a little pea or 

 barlej'-meal, and some astringent cordial drink. Suet boiled in milk is 

 by some persons used, but three out of twenty, to which it was given by 

 Mr. Price, died ; while the remainder, which were treated in the manner 

 just mentioned, v.ere mostly saved*. 



Pining is a distemper of a very singular nature, which appears to have 

 been only of late years introduced, and chieflv exists in the pastures of the 

 Cheviot Hills, the chain of moimtainous land running through some parts 

 of the shires of Roxburgh, Selkirk, and Peebles,' with a few of the pastoral 

 Scottish districts, and seems to be occasioned by costiveness ; but is not 



* See Price " On Sheep Grazing," p, 478, and Youatt •> Ou Sheep," p. 469. 



