180 DISEASES OF SWINE AND OTHER ANIMALS. 



mucous membranes of the alimieiitary canal. In this first mode of attack 

 the disease is seated in the serous membranes. 



Second mode of attack. — Begins with fever, as in the first mode, but, 

 although the brain is affected, the force of the disease is exerted more 

 directly upon the stomach, bowels, and lungs (upon the mucous mem- 

 branes). The hog loses his appetite, grows rapidly thin, aud instead of 

 the discharge from the eyes it is from the bowels. He lurches li'om side 

 to side as he moves along, is weak in the loins, has diarrhea, often vom- 

 its, and worms are sometimes discharged from both stomach and bowels. 

 The discharge from the bowels is of a yellow color, seemingly mixed 

 with pus. In this mode of attack aU the parasites that infest the hog, 

 of whatever character, seem roused to unusual activity, and the hog, 

 unable to partake of a sufficient amount of nourishment, these parasites, 

 fixing themselves in many parts of the body, prey upon its vitals until 

 it succumbs. 



Cough is a prominent symptom, sometimes from the first ; is of a spas- 

 modic character, and apparently due to some extent to nervous irritation. 

 In some cases, at every fit of coughing there would be a discharge from 

 the bowels. 



Character of the disease. — As before stated, it attacks first the serous, 

 secondly the mucous membranes, or it may \)& confined to either. 



In the first mode of attack the fever is of a sthenic character, and 

 presents many of the characteristics of measles in the human being. 

 There is fever, discharges from the eyes, sometimes a discharge from the 

 nostrils, and discoloration of the skin. Cough, which is an attendant 

 upon measles in man, is generally absent in the hog in the beginning of 

 this disease. I prefer to consider it a fever developed in the same man- 

 ner as typhus or typhoid fever is in man ; that there is " blood poison- 

 ing," and that the disease germs are intangible ; that it has no symptom 

 in common with cholera in man, save the dian-hea. The action of the 

 infection upon the blood is quite the opposite to that of cholera, for in 

 the disease in question there is a lack of fibrin and of hiematin ; it is pale, 

 deficient in red corpuscles, and does not " cup," I do not believe that 

 it is dependent upon any particular condition of the atmosphere, except 

 that portion immediately surrounding the diseased animals. I think there 

 can be no doubt that it may be communicated to other hogs, and more 

 readily to those of a like breed, and living under like conditions. Being (as 

 I think) not primarily of a typhoid character, I cannot see any reason why 

 this term should be applied to the disease. The truth is, I believe, that 

 the hog is sick some time before it is generally noticed, and that a little 

 attention given him at the commencement will stop it. Is this, then, of 

 a typhoid character "1 In confirmation of this I will state a little circum- 

 stance related to me by a gentleman in this neighborhood. A colored 

 barber called upon him at his farm one day, and while looking at a fine 

 hog, which the owner said would eat but little, and appeared to be sick, 

 the barber said : " Your hog has the cholera. I will cure him"; and im- 

 mediately, to the great amusement of the gentleman, caught the hog, 

 opened his mouth, made two incisions in the papillae at the root of the 

 tongue, aud then began rubbing the fore-legs of the animal with a corn 

 cob. Telling the gentlemen to give the hog a dose of some piu'gative 

 medicine, he went his way. In a few hoiu-s the hog began to eat and 

 recovered in a short time. 



Of infection. — Hogs of the same class, and placed under like circum- 

 stances, are more liable to convey the infection to each other than to 

 those differently situated. I met with a farmer in Nebraska who was 



