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498 HANDY-BOOK OF HUSBANDRY. 



thriftless appearance, their great liability to suffer from coughs 

 being readily excited by exposure to cold or wet, or by changes 

 of food. 



*' Pigs, from their susceptibility to cold, are often attacked by 

 rheumatism^ especially in its more chronic forms. This is a 

 constitutional disease depending on the presence in the blood of 

 ' some poisonous materials, probably analogous to those found 

 ' within the gouty joints of men. Like other constitutional dis- 

 ' eases, it is accompanied by certain local symptoms. In pigs, it 

 ' chiefly affects the fibrous serous tissues of the larger joints, gives 

 ' evidence of local inflammation, and general fever, progresses 

 ' with slow.and lingering steps, and does not, like ordinary inflam- 

 ' mation, terminate in suppuration and gangrene. It most com- 

 ' monly occurs among young pigs, and usually owes its origin to 

 ' lying in a wet cold bed. It always produces alteration of 

 ' structure in the parts affected, which predisposes the individual 

 ' to subsequent attacks, and tends to reappear in the progeny, 

 ' rendering them also specially predisposed to the complaint. 



" Scrofula is more common in pigs than in any other of the 

 ' domestic animals. It sometimes carries off whole litters before 

 ' they are many weeks old. * * * Consumption exhibits the 

 ' same symptoms as in other animals — gradually increasing ema- 

 ' elation ; imperfect digestion and assimilation ; disturbed respira- 

 ' tion, with a frequent short cough ; weakened and unusually 

 ' accelerated circulation ; diarrhea of a most intractable kind, 

 ' often merging into dysentery j and general prostration of the 

 ' vital powers. * * * 



'' Scrofulous Tumors are sometimes met with among pigs. * * * 

 ' They are produced by the fusion of degenerated lymph, incapa- 

 ' ble of perfect organization, and mixed up with tuberculous mat- 

 ' ter. * * * These local symptoms are often accompanied 

 ' by some of the usual constitutional symptoms of scrofula, as im- 

 ' pairment of digestion and assimilation. * * In conclusion, 

 ' we may repeat, that many of the most common, and some of 

 ' the most serious, diseases of sheep and pigs, are hereditary, and 

 ' that they spring from certain vices of structure or disproportion 



