2g8 Veterinary Medicine. 



In gangrenous ergotism a necrotic sore witli more or less 

 snrronnding swelling nia}^ be seen, and a line of demarcation 

 forms of a pink or purplish aspect along which the separation of 

 the dead tissue takes place. The slough is usually of a dark red 

 or black color, the red globules having apparently migrated into 

 the tissues and piled up in the capillaries in the early stages of 

 stagnation. When the line of separation is higher, the line of de- 

 marcation completely encircles the limb, the inflammation and 

 swelling is very marked just above this line, the skin and soft 

 tissues beneath drying and withering up into a dark red leathery 

 mass, and this is gradually separated by the formation of a 

 granulating surface above. The process of .separation takes place 

 much more slowly through the bony tissues, and not unfrequently 

 the soft tissues having become detached, the lower part of the 

 limb is separated at the first joint below the line of demarcation 

 and the bone from that line down to its free end remains as a 

 projecting necrosed .stump. In the ear or tail the necrotic por- 

 tion withers up into a .stiff rigid shrunken slough which becomes 

 detached sooner or later by mechanical violence. 



In the nervous ergotism the symptoms are largely tho.se of 

 the adynamia, paresis and convulsions already described. 



In abortion from ergotism there are usually few premonitory 

 symptoms, and the occurrence is to be explained by the number 

 of victims in a herd eating ergot or smut. 



Lesions. These vary greatly. Usually the congestion and 

 inflammation are mo.st prominent in the abomasum and small in- 

 testine, complicated by ecchymosis and even extravasation which 

 may so thicken the mucosa as to block the intestine (Walley). 

 The mesenteric glands are usually gorged with blood and of a 

 deep red The brain may be nearly normal or violently congested 

 and with its meninges covered with petechiae. 



Diagnosis. From anthrax this affection is distinguished by the 

 ab.sence of the .specific large bacillus in the blood and of the 

 marked -enlargement of the spleen, by the great prominence 

 of the nervous symptoms in many cases, and by the history of a 

 dietetic cause. 



From the coccidian hemorrhagic dysentery it is diagnosed by 

 the absence of the coccidia in the stools and the predominance of 

 the nervous .systems. 



