INFECTIOUS DISEASES. 545 



culty to sheep aiul pouts, and cattle seem to be entirely immune. It 

 runs a variable course and usually produces the death of the animal 

 alFected with it. It is characterized by the formation of neoplasms, 

 or nodules, of connective tissue, which defjenerate into ulcers, from 

 wliich exude a peculiar discharge. It is accompanied with a variable 

 degree of fever, according to the rapidity of its course. It is sub- 

 ject to various complications of the lymi)hatic glands, of the lungs, 

 of the testicles, of the internal organs, and of the subcutaneous con- 

 nective tissue. 



Ilistor}/. — Glanders is one of the olilest diseases of which we have 

 definite knowledire in the history of medicine. Absyitus, the (Jreek 

 veterinarian in the army of Constantine the Great, described it with 

 considerable accuracy and recognized the contagiousness of its chai-- 

 acter. Another Greek veterinarian, A'egctius Kcnntus. who lixed in 

 the time of Theodosius (381 A. D.), described, under the name of 

 "malleus liumidus," a disease of the horse characterized by a nasal 

 discharge and accompanied by superficial idcers. He recognized 

 the contagious properties of the discharge of the external ulcers, and 

 recommended that all animals sick with the disease be separated at 

 once with the greatest care from the otheis and should be pastured 

 in separate fields, for fear the other animals should become affected. 



In 1<)8'2 Sollysel. the stable master of Louis XIV, published an 

 account of glanders and farcy, which he considered closely related to 

 each other, although he did not recognize them as identical. He 

 admitted the existence of a virus which conununicated the disease 

 from an infected animal to a sound one. He called special attention 

 to the feed troughs and water buckets as being the media of conta- 

 gion. He divided glanders into two forms — one malignant and con 

 tagious and the other benign — and he stated that there was alwnys 

 danger of infection. 



Garsiiult in 1740 said that "as this disease is comnninicated very 

 easily and can infect in a very short time a i)rcMligi(tus number of 

 horses by means of the discharges which may be licked up. animals 

 infected with glanders should be destroyed." 



Bourgelat. the founder of veterinary schools, in his *" Klements of 

 Ilippiatry," ])ublished in 1755, establishes glanders as a virulent 

 disease. 



Extensive outi)reaks of glanders are descrribed as i)revailing in the 

 great armies of continental Europe and England from time to time 

 during the periods of all the wars of the last few centuries. 



(ilanders was imported into America at the close of the eighteenth 



century, and l>efore the end of the first half of the last century had 



K]>read to a considerable degiw among the horses of the Middle and 



immediately adjoining Southern States. This disease was unknown 



36444°— 16 35 



