43«) now TO MAKE THE FARM PAY. 



The fly sometimes deposits its egg in the ulcer, and maggots 

 appear almost before — sometimes actually before — there are 

 aiiv cavities formed into which they can penetrate. The early 

 appearance of maggots greatly accelerates the progress of dis- 

 organization in the structures. 



" Tlie fore feet are usually first attacked, sometimes both of 

 them simultaneously, but more generally only one of them. 

 The anima'l at first manifests but little constitutional disturb- 

 ance. It eats as is its wont. When the disease has partly run 

 its course in one foot, the other fore foot is likely to be attacked, 

 and presently the hind ones. When a foot becomes consider- 

 ably disorganized, it is lield up by the animal. When another 

 one reaches the same state, the miserable sufferer seeks its food 

 on its knees; and, if forced to rise and walk, its strange, hob- 

 bling gait betrays the intense agony it endures on bringing its 

 ulcerated feet in contact with the ground. There is a bare spot 

 on the under side of the brisket of the size of the palm of a 

 man's hand, but perhaps a little longer, which looks red and 

 inflamed. There is a degree of general fever, and the appetite 

 is dull. The animal rapidly loses condition, but retains con- 

 siderable strength. Nowhere else do sheep seem to me to 

 exhibit such tenacity of life. After the disappearance of the 

 bottom of the hoof, the maggot speedily closes the scene. 

 Where the rotten foot is brought in contact with the side in 

 lying down, the filthy, ulcerous matter adheres to and saturates 

 the short wool of the shorn sheep ; and maggots also are either 

 carried there by the foot, or they are speedily generated by the 

 fly. A black crust soon forms, and raises a little higher round 

 the spot: it is the decomposition of the surrounding structures,— 

 wool, skin, and muscle,— and innumerable maggots are at work 

 below, burrowing into the living tissues and eating up the mise- 

 rable animal alive. The black, festering mass rapidly extends, 



