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that I had not read before is the positive assertion 

 that no non-ruminant animal can take the disease. 

 No\v this assertion has no truth in it whatever. 

 Rabbits have been put into a close box where dis- 

 eased beasts have been, and every one of them has 

 caught the complaint, and died. I know this to be 

 true, because it was a relation of my own who tried 

 the experiment. This third report repeats the old 

 assertion we have seen so often, that the disease 

 occurs most where there is greatest traffic, or that it 

 follows the line of traffic, as they phrase it. An old 

 riddle asks, " Why do white sheep eat more than 

 black ones ?" Then come the solemn guesses, such 

 as that "black absorbs caloric, and renders less 

 nutriment necessary," &c., &c. Then comes the 

 real answer, " Because there are more of them." 

 So we may put the above into the form of a riddle, 

 and ask, " Why is there more plague in those places 

 where traffic in cattle is greatest, than in others ?" 

 Then come the solemn guesses, such as, " That 

 the disease being only produced by poisonous emana- 

 tions that bubble out of the ground in Russia, and 

 are carried west by steppe cattle, therefore," &c., &c. 

 Then comes the real answer, " Because there are 

 more of them." 



In reading these reports I have wondered a good 

 deal how it is that Mr. Lowe, who is I believe on 

 the Commission, does not keep the logic in better 

 order ; but I suppose the answer is, " What is one 

 among so many ?" 



