130 CONTAGIOUS DISEASES OF DOMESTICATED ANIMALS. 



bristles, fat, guts), as well as fodder aud straw, from the present obnox- 

 ious and injurious restrictions. 



Unfortunately In all modern legislation on the subject not only are 

 the laws peculiar to the individual state, but they reflect the jealousies 

 and lack of adjacent states. Thus in the absence of official trust-' 

 worthy and trusted reports a whole country has its trade restricted, 

 delayed, and seriously injured for a slight outbreak which could easily 

 be sequestrated and a perfect guarantee of its non-extension furnished. 

 It is to be feared, indeed, that in. some instances what is i)racticed un- 

 der the name of veterinary sanitary police is conceived more in the 

 spirit of maintaining the high price of meat than of restricting and ex- 

 tirpating animal plagues. 



If the work could be made international, and if the plagues could be 

 effectively dealt with in the local areas of their prevalence, all the more 

 obnoxious interference with commerce might be done away with, the 

 present temptation to clandestine trade in infected animals obviated, 

 and a better and more rebable protection afforded. 



The inspection of animals at the frontiers has proved practically useless, 

 because animals that have become infected but do not yet show signs 

 of disease are necessarily allowed to pass, and with the modern immense 

 railway traffic in fat animals a sufficient quarantine is practically ]n'o- 

 hibitory of importation. 



Another grave objection to this system is that animals found diseased 

 are simply sent back over the frontier, and as the service is national 

 and not international, the neighboring state is not warned of the active 

 focus of infection thus created within it. 



Certificates of origin and health emanating from officials and based 

 on expert knowledge of the sanitary condition of the district furnishing 

 the stock should be really valuable documents, whereas certificates 

 made out by irresponsible individuals, and with which the smugglers are 

 now most numerously supplied, are grounds for suspicion rather than 

 confidence. 



The following sum up the principles which ought to dominate in an 

 international veterinary sanitary service: 



a. Each state ought to notify the governments of adjacent states of 

 those joining the international agreement, and of all that desire it, of 

 every outbreak of rinderpest, lung plague, sheep-pox, maladie du coit^ 

 glanders, aud rabies, its exact locality and extension ; and this should 

 be done as quickly as possible, even by telegraph. 



Other grave maladies transmissible aud importable, and especially 

 the typhoid affections and sheep scab, should be made the object of ex- 

 traordinary precautions and mutual notification. 



The authorities ought to carefully investigate the channel by which 

 Contagion finds its entiance and is proi)agated ; and the officials of the 

 country froui which it was derived should be furnished with the infor- 

 mation necessary to enable them to trace it to its earlier sources. 



I 



Pi 



