10 SMAM, roX IX SIIKKP. 



Of Intc years the progress of these distempers has 

 been regularly traced in Europe; and the one from 

 Avhich tiie cattle of Italy, Germany, France, Holland, 

 and Great Britain, suffered in 1711-12, came from 

 Hungary, being imported by some oxen into the neigh- 

 bourhood of Padua. The infection seems to have 

 been connuunicated by the saliva, for, say the histo- 

 rians, " when this is dropped on the grass, and sound 

 animals are innncdiately placed on the same pasture, 

 they contract the disorder, and in some bullocks the 

 tongue was inflamed and covered with many red blis- 

 ters." From this description it would appear that the 

 malady resembled the one now existing in this country, 

 and to which we have given the name of Eczema 

 Epizootica. 



In 1713 Rome and its neighbourhood suffered 

 greatly from the same epizootic. The prophylactic mea- 

 sures had recourse to by Pope Clement XI are said, by 

 Lancisi, to have preserved, for two years, the cattle in 

 the Ecclesiastical dominions ; but the disease was then 

 introduced. It is recorded that orders w^ere issued to 

 su])press a fair about to be held at Frusino, a town 

 bordering on the kingdom of Naples, and that the 

 drovers, being thus prevented from disposing of their 

 oxen, took them by circuitous roads to Rome, where 

 thej^ sold them at a low price. This circumstance also 

 facilitated the disposal of many of the cattle to various 

 persons residing in the villages through which they 

 passed, and thus the affection spread through the 

 Papal states, and killed nearly thirty thousand animals 

 in the succeeding nine months ; a register having been 

 kept from October 1713 to April 1714, when the 

 malady is stated to have ceased. 



