Milk Sickness. " The Trembles." 325 



herds should be an occasion for a verdict for damages at common 

 law. 



Treatment in Animals. Provision is first made against ex- 

 tension of the infection. The floor should be kept clean, dry 

 and covered with sawdust, tan bark, gypsum or litter sprinkled 

 with these or with phenic acid. The herd should be divided into 

 two lots — the apparently sound, and unsound kept strictly apart 

 under separate attendants, above all separate milkers. As soon 

 as any symptoms are shown by an animal in the sound enclosure 

 it must be instantly transferred to the other and its stall disin- 

 fected. Antiseptics such as gaseous iodine (two tablespoonful of 

 tincture of iodine, thrown into a quart of boiling water twice 

 daily), sulphurous acid, salicylic acid, creolin, lysol or other 

 ointment on the feet and teats, may also be used. In this way it 

 may be possible to save a number from an attack, yet most com- 

 monly the exposure is common and universal and the malady de- 

 velops in all simultaneously. For those already attacked, gruels, 

 mashes, and cool pulped, finely sliced or boiled roots may be all that 

 is required, the disease runs its course and recovery ensues in 15 

 days. As local dressings the following may serve as examples : 

 for the mouth, borax, chlorate of potash, salicylate or sulphite of 

 soda 2 drs. to 1 quart water ; phenic acid, creolin, or lysol, one or 

 two teaspoonfuls to a quart; for the foot, clean the interdigital space 

 and apply tar and carbolic acid with bandage, or use solutions of 

 creolin, lysol, pyoktanin or blue-stone ; in aggravated cases strong 

 mineral acids with tar ; for the teats, ointments of boric or 

 salicylic acid, creolin, lysol, naphthalin or uapthol. Separation 

 of the hoof or mammitis will require treatment according to in- 

 dications. 



MILK SICKNESS. "THE TREMBLES." 



Geographical distribution : timbered lands in the United States ; different 

 altitudes, and geological formations ; on hills and wooded bottoms ; known 

 to Indians and pioneers ; now unknown where formerly prevailed. Con- 

 tagion : through milk ; no specific microbe found in every case. Alleged 

 causes : rhus ; nickel ; spirillum ; bacillus. Prevails in dry seasons ; con- 

 tracted under night exposure ; confined to given enclosures ; to late summer 

 and autumn. Not conveyed by contagion, indefinitely, as are plagues. Men 

 show very varying susceptibility ; young children may be relatively immune. 



