Pidou Cattle Disease, etc. 641 



only successful remedy. Most things can wait for the call, 

 assembling and action of a legislature ; the infection of cattle 

 plague can not. Such laws are not superfluous. If never called 

 for they still show a wise provision against a terrible, though 

 remote, possibility ; if really called for and they are not found 

 ready, the great cattle industry and even the agriculture of the 

 continent may be largely sacrificed by the neglect. 



As guardian of the interests of The Philippines the United 

 States is to-day called upon to consider the question of ex- 

 terminating the disease which our interference brought upon the 

 islands. On the uufenced lands of these islands we have to face 

 on a smaller scale the problem of stamping out the plague which 

 has baffled the wisdom of Europe and Asia. The individual 

 islands may perhaps be taken independently, the cattle collected 

 in small herds under fence, and by the sacrifice of a few the re- 

 mainder of any herd that shows infection ma}' be immunized, 

 and the premises where they are confined disinfected until finally 

 no more cases occur. But whatever method is adopted the seclu- 

 sion of all within well fenced areas is the most important con- 

 sideration. No nation has ever succeeded in extirpating this nor 

 any other important infection in animals when they are allowed 

 to run at large and mingle freely, herd with herd, on uufenced 

 land. 



PICTOU CATTLE DISEASE. HEPATIC CIRRHOSIS. 



This is a fatal affection of cattle met with in the counties of 

 Pictou and Antigonish, Nova Scotia, which seems to make a slow 

 extension from farm to farm, but does not spread widely after the 

 manner of a disease propagated by contagion alone, apart from 

 other concurrent causes. 



Alleged Causes. E. F. Thayer (1880) tells us that the inhabi- 

 tants traced its origin to the arrival from Scotland, about 1853, 

 of a ship in earth ballast, containing the seeds of the common 

 ragweed of Europe (Ambrosia Artemisiaefolia), alleging that the 

 trouble extended with the extension of this weed. This plant 

 has a strong odor (it is known in Pictou as " Stinking Willie"), 

 and, like other plants shedding an abundance of odoriferous pol- 

 4i 



