56 



NA TURE 



[May 1 6, 1889 



human scarlet fever to cow disease. As is well known, 

 the Medical Department of the Local Government Board, 

 through the Reports of Mr. Power, Dr. Cameron, and Dr. 

 Klein (1886), have brought forward a formidable array of 

 facts, by which it was established that, in an epidemic of 

 scarlet fever prevailing towards the end of 1885 in the 

 north of London, the contagium was distributed through 

 a milk supply derived from particular milch cows at a 

 dairy farm at Hendon, which cows were affected with 

 ar specific eruptive and visceral disease — the Hendon 

 disease. It was further shown (Report of the Medical 

 Officer of the Local Government Board, 1887) that this 

 cow disease is to be considered as cow scarlatina, and 

 that both human and cow scarlatina are associated with 

 and caused by a microbe, the Streptococcus scarlatince. 



The veterinary profession, headed by the Agricultural 

 Department of the Privy Council, have been foremost in 

 the opposition to these statements. In the Report " On 

 Eruptive Diseases of the Teats and Udders of Cows," 

 issued towards the end of 1888 by Prof Brown, the chief 

 of the Agricultural Department, a superabundance of 

 opinions were forthcoming, and, as often happens under 

 the circumstances, fact has appeared for a while in danger 

 of being smothered in the confusion engendered. But, 

 happily, facts are stubborn things, and not easily stifled. 

 However much trampled on, facts are ever prone to re- 

 assert themselves and to multiply, and one result of the 

 cow controversy has been that the recently issued Report 

 of the Medical Officer of the Local Government Board 

 gives promise of a new and abundant crop of them. The 

 first subject bearing on this controversy and dealt with in 

 the recent volume is the significance of the Streptococcus 

 scarlatince. Many and various have been the assertions 

 as to this microbe being an unessential concomitant of 

 the disease. The experiments now made by Dr. Klein 

 (Appendix B, No. i, Section A.), with artificial cultures of 

 the Streptococcus scarlatina; on recently-calved milch 

 cowf, show that an eruptive and visceral disease is pro- 

 duced in these cows which closely resembles the Hendon 

 disease, and consequently lend firm support to the view 

 previously enunciated by the Medical Department that 

 the Streptococcus scarlatince is the real microbe of scarlet 

 fever. 



Amongst a further array of facts therein marshalled, 

 some that are historical obtain, in view of the cow 

 controversy, fresh interest and importance. It is pointed 

 out (Section B.) that, before the time of Jenner, " cow- 

 pox" was the familiar name given to every sort of 

 sore on cows' teats ; that, with recognition by Jenner of a 

 form of sore denominated by him variolce vaccina, one 

 particular cow-pox obtained the distinctive name of 

 " true," while all others became designated as "spurious " ; 

 and that, except for Ceely's notable endeavours to obtain 

 better knowledge, '■ spurious cow-pox," blister-pock, and 

 the like vague terms continued to be used indifferently 

 for all sores on the teats and udders that were not 

 " true cow-pox." So the matter stood for eighty years, 

 until at the Hendon farm a second definite member 

 of this group was recognized by Mr. Power, when the 

 old division into true and spurious cow-pox became 

 manifestly insufficient. It was now seen that the name 

 " spurious cow-pox " had in all probability been used to 

 cover a variety of sores having essential differences in 

 nature, just as, until the time of Jenner, the name " cow- 

 pock " had covered along with various other things the 

 disease which we know as vaccinia. But it is one thing 

 to have learnt the essential nature of those sores of the 

 cow that are concerned with vaccinia or scarlatina in 

 the human subject, and quite another thing to affirm the 

 distinguishing characters by which these may be recog- 

 nized from other sores that once on a time laid claim to 

 being equally with them "cow-pox "or" spurious cow-pox." 

 It is very obvious, too, that our new discontent with the 

 name " spurious cow-pox " does not at once give us know- 



ledge of those sores which remain on the list, while it is 

 equally clear that there are many kinds of such sores. 



In these circumstances there was nothing to be done 

 but to begin over again the study of cow-poxes with a view 

 to learning of each one its complete natural history. And 

 this has been the procedure of the Medical Department, 

 with the result that a considerable instalment of positive 

 knowledge respecting certain cow eruptions is afforded 

 in the Report already referred to. When it is said that 

 there was no alternative procedure to that adopted by 

 the Medical Department, no more is meant than that from 

 the scientific stand-point no alternative was possible. 

 Other ways there were, of course, of dealing with the 

 subject, as, for instance, in its " practical " or trade 

 aspects, or from the sentimental point of view. That 

 adopted by the Veterinary Department of the Privy 

 Council is not easy of definition, but it may be described 

 as a method of composite character by which uncertain 

 science and excess of sentiment are oddly interjumbled. 



It has consisted in flat denial of the possibility of cow 

 scarlatina, along with reversion in the matter of cow- 

 po.xes to the attitude of the cow-man of pre-Jennerian days. 

 Thus Prof. Brown, in the earlier pages of his Report in 

 denial of cow scarlatina, speaks indifferently of " eruptive 

 disease among cows," " udder disease among cows," 

 '"outbreaks of udder disease common as usual," "a very 

 common eruptive affection which is usually called cow- 

 pox by dairymen," and the like. And throughout his 

 Report Prof. Brown studiously avoids giving a name to 

 any udder disease or diseases with which he is dealing. 

 Only once does his reader, when referred to Plate 4, at 

 the end of Prof. Brown's volume, obtain hope of some de- 

 finite nomenclature ; but he turns to the plate in question 

 only to be confronted with such terms as " blister-pock" 

 and " blue-pock " — terms of the pre-Jennerian prototype. 

 Having thus smoothed the way for discovery of a cow-pox 

 (or "Hendon disease") not associated with scarlatina 

 among consumers of the milk of the affected animals. 

 Prof Brown would seem to exercise almost superfluous 

 caution in his phrasing of the following passage at p. 

 vii. of his Report : — " Leaving for the present the subject 

 of the original Hendon cow disease in 1885-86, it is 

 necessary to refer to outbreaks of the same or similar ' 

 cow disease which occurred at Hendon and elsewhere in 

 1887-88." Be this as it may, he had of course no difficulty 

 whatever in finding instances of one or another cow malady, 

 which it pleased him to call " Hendon disease," not as- 

 sociated with scarlatina among persons consuming the 

 implicated mill:. This sufficed for Prof Brown, and for 

 a while, perhaps, he was altogether content. 



But Prof Brown's confidence in his own opinion, 

 fortified as it had been by his failure in the early stage 

 of his investigation to find any udder affection associated 

 with illness t.f scarlatinal sort among consumers of the 

 milk of the affected cows, was destined later on to re- 

 ceive somewhat rude shocks. Prof McFadyean, a 

 coadjutor of Prof. Brown's, having made discovery at 

 Edinburgh of an udder malady associated with sore 

 throat among persons consuming the milk of the cows 

 affected by it, Prof Brown, on personal examination 

 of the Edinburgh cows, was constrained to admit for 

 this disease clinical characters distinguishing it from 

 any that he himself had been investigating, and patho- 

 logical features very similar to those of the original 

 Hendon disease. 



Of this Edinburgh disease (the pathology and cetiology 

 of which are described by Dr. Klein in Appendix B., No. 2) 

 Prof McFadyean notes that it "differed in every im- 

 portant respect from true cow-pox," and that (hke the 

 Hendon disease) " it did not cause sores on the hands of 

 the milkers." Here, then, on the evidence of the Veterinary 

 Department, was a cow malady that was not cow-pox, 



' 1 he italics are curs. 



