HISTORICAL NOTICE. 45 



marked by a visit of epidemic catarrhal fever all over Europe, 

 spreading from east to west. In this catarrh horses also 

 participated, being, it was remarked, attacked first. In 1693 

 a similar attack is also recorded, at first appearing amongst 

 horses, to be followed by a similar fever in man. In 1699 

 Ave have notice of a widespread visit of this catarrhal fever 

 both in Europe and America, while Ruthly, in his liistory of 

 the weather and seasons, mentions that in 1727-28, over the 

 greater part of England and Ireland, and also in the remote 

 parts of the kingdom, horses were seized with cough, sore 

 throat, and shortness of breath, and that many died. 



In 1732 Gibson, of London, gives a very interesting and full 

 account of a severe horse distemper, which broke out amongst 

 the horses of the metropolis and over the countr}-. 



In this notice of the epizooty of 1732, Gibson mentions that 

 although not fatal, he believed it to be very catching, seeing 

 that where any horse was seized with it, those on each side 

 were very generally infected as soon as he began to run at the 

 nose. 



This epidemic, or epizootic catarrh, appears to have had a 

 most universal distribution, and to have produced universal 

 alarm, both Old and New World being visited by it, travelling 

 m both apparently from north to south. 



From 1732 to 1767 there is only notice of a moderate 

 amount of epidemic or epizootic fevers. Huxham, in " Ob- 

 servations on the Air and Epidemical Diseases, London, 1758," 

 notices that in 1743 many horses suffered from illness and 

 emaciation, the result of colds and sore throats. "While in the 

 latter year influenza again spread over both America and 

 Europe, affecting first animals, and afterwards men, being 

 particularly virulent in London and over England. 



The prevalence of this catarrhal disease was again, by those 

 chronicling its ravages, connected with meteorological and 

 telluric disturbances. 



Since the beginning of the present century influenza has 

 in this country appeared amongst our horses in a markedly 

 epizootic form on several occasions, certainly in 1850, 1863, 

 1864, and in 1871 and 1872. In America, under the name of 

 "Horse Disease," there was in 1872 and 1873 a very widely 

 distributed — and although not very fatal, nevertheless, from 



