CONTAGIOUS DISEASES OF DOMESTICATED ANIMALS 141 



PUTZ'S VIEWS. 



Piitz does not hesitate to prououuce the physiological symptoms 

 and pathological lesions as together reasonably pathognomic. He is a 

 strong partisan of inoculation, provided the operation is relocated after 

 a lapse of time, and above all if repeated again and again. It is use- 

 less or injurious for animals that are already infected, and the duration 

 of the immunity acquired in successful cases varies with the individual 

 susceptibility, as does vaccination for the prevention of small-pox. It 

 is especially valuable in places where movements of great numbers of 

 cattle are continually going on, and where sequestration is in conse- 

 quence imi)ossible. Where, on the other hand, there are few move- 

 ments of stock the isolation and slaughter of the diseased and strongly 

 suspected beasts is speedily effective. In Holland with inoculation the 

 disease has been confined to the narrowest limits, while in most i)artsof 

 Germany it has been stationary or increasing, and in Saxony with little 

 inoculation it has in recent years attacked three times the number of 

 victims seized in i87o-'76. 



In addition to the measnres of sequestration he advocates : 1. That 

 the quarantine mark should bear the year so that it may be afterward 

 known when they were diseased or suspected. 2. That all diseased ^ud 

 strongly suspected animals should be killed, and that the entire herd 

 should be slaughtered when judged necessary, indemnity being granted 

 for the same. 3. When, owing to freipient changes in a large herd, or 

 when, from economical considerations such herd may not be slaughtered, 

 the same should be compulsorily inoculated. Inoculation maj* be au- 

 thorized in an infected country, if desired, bj* the proprietor, and conse- 

 quent losses should be paid for. 4. Every beast from a quarantined 

 herd which dies or is killed ought to be the subject of an autopsy by a 

 competent person. With this precaution such cattle should be devoted 

 to slaughter for beef as much as possible, no necessary precaution being 

 forgotten. 



ACTION OF THE CONGKESS. 



A. — Diagnosis. 



The question of diagnosis of lung plague gave rise to a somewhat lengthy, 

 animated, and fruitless discussion as to whether this disease can arisespon- 

 taneoush/, or whether it is ercryivhere a>t<l alicai/s the resnlt of contafiion. 

 The advocates of a spontaneous origin of the disease acknowledged ^hat 

 the occurrence of a spontaneous case was extremely rare, and that in 

 spite of spontaneous cases a s^'Stem of repression, based on a constant 

 assumption of contagion, was the best ; yet they claimed, as already 

 stated of Degive, that the malady may originate by the transformation 

 of harmless germs into virulent ones, or it may be by the transformation 

 of normal histological elements of the body into diseased elements 

 having a power of propagating themselves indefinitely. The opponents, 



