THE LUNG PLAGUE. 13 



thus is it establislied, beyond doubt, tliat tlie influences operating in the 

 transmission of contagious pleuropneumonia were at work then. Val- 

 entini committed the common error of attributing the king plague to 

 the weather, but hfs reference to a wide-spread pulmonary disorder 

 among cattle is sufiaciently distinct to warrant our dissenting from Del- 

 afond when he says that nothing can authorize the conclusion that the 

 disease described by Valentini was the pleuro-pneumonia which prevails 

 to-day among horned cattle. 



Sauberg, whose prize essay on the lung plague is worthy of the highest 

 praise, draws attention to the fact that the propagation westward of 

 the Eussian murrain, at the commencement of the eighteenth century, 

 directed the attention of the most learned naturalists and physicians 

 to the investigation of the plagues of animals, and thus a marked 

 influence was exerted in the development of veterinary science. 



Kanold, Steurlin, Ramazzini, Lancisi, Bates, Lanzoni, Sebroek, 

 Fischer, Scheuchzer, Bottani, Muratori, Camper, Haller, and numerous 

 others, have contributed to enrich the science of comparative pathology 

 by references to outbreaks of epizootic aphthiP, lung plague, rinderpest, 

 variolous fevers, carbuncular and other diseases, which committed great 

 havoc up to the time that an illustrious Frenchman, Bourgelat, resolved 

 to establish a college for the education of veterinary surgeons. All 

 references to the contagious pleuro-pneumonia are of little practical 

 moment until we come to the labors of Bourgelat himself. He did not, 

 it is true— as nobody ever did— on first studying this disease, recognize 

 its contagious character. He met with it in Franche-Compte, where it 

 had been known for years under the name of "murie." He described it 

 as distinguished by a short dry cough, much fever, great oppression, 

 especially after an animal has eaten anything, loss of appetite, fetor 

 of breath, dryness of nose, and sometimes discharge of thick whitish 

 matter from the nostrils. His description of the pleuritic adhesions, 

 the deposits of gelatinous layers of different colors around the lungs, 

 the lividity and engorgement of the lungs, and distension of the chest 

 by a reddish, frothy, sanious, or purulent liquid, is entirely satisftictory, 

 and indicates how much in advance of his times Bourgelat was in his 

 description of this malady. As there has been a disposition to revive 

 the treatment of the lung plague by fumigations, I may mention that, 

 among other remedies, Bourgelat recommended acetic acid to be used 

 in this way. 



The malady which had thus stationed itself in France, had also estab- 

 lished secure hold in other parts of Europe, and we learn of its preva- 

 lence in 1743 in Zurich and the adjacent cantons of Switzerland. It 

 continued to invade that country by importations from the grand duchy 

 of Baden, and in 1773 the great physiologist, Haller, published the 

 ablest memoir on this disease that appeared during the eighteenth 

 century.* He spoke of it as a lung disease, beginning as an inflanuna- 



*Abhaucllunff von tier Viehseuclie. Vou Herru. Alb. Haller. Beru, 1773. 



