CONTAGIOUS DISEASES, 817 



said to be the most potent and effective means of destroying the virus; and 

 hence, through aeration by a direct and continuous current of air is one of 

 the best ways of diluting, and at length destroying, the seeds of this dread 



So quick is the development of the disease that death sometimes occurs 

 after the second day, though usually after the fifth day; and an average of 

 from seventy to eighty per cent, of the animals attacked die. Goats, 

 sheep and deer are also attacked, and the probability is that all ruminating 

 animals are subject to the contagion; but sheep and goats are not liable to 

 so large a percentage of mortality as are neat cattle. 



Many of the symptoms of rinderpest occur in pleuro-pneumonia in its 

 contagious form; also, in malignant catarrhal fever, and in foot-and-mouth 

 disease. But pleuro-pneumonia is distinguished from rinderpest by the 

 absence of the characteristic eruptions upon the mucous membranes. 

 Malignant catarrhal fever is distinguished therefrom by the dimness of the 

 transparent cornea of the eye, which in rinderpest remains clear. The 

 foot-and-mouth disease differs from rinderpest by ulceration of the feet, 

 and the less degree of fever. 



The alteration of the mucous membrane in rinderpest, heretofore spoken 

 of, may very soon be observed in the vagina of cows, which becoii^es 

 spotted or striped with red, and, in about twenty-four hours after, small 

 yellowish white or gray specks are clearly distinguished on the red spots 

 and stripes. These are formed by the loosening of the cuticle which may 

 be rubbed off, leaving in its place a dark red depression. 



There is no known remedy for this disease, and hence the only security 

 against its spread is in the enactment of the most stringent laws, first, for 

 its prevention; second, for its extinction, by isolation of all suspected 

 animals, and the prompt killing and burial of all infected ones. In this 

 respect the laws of the German Empire are taQ most perfect, and our 

 State and general governments might take a hsson therefrom, in dealing 

 with pleuro-pneumonia and other malignant contagious diseases of animals, 

 if the machinery of politics could be succi ssfully dissociated from the 

 appointment of oflicers for the investigations sought 



When an animal has this disease and recc vers, he is rendered insus- 

 ceptible to another attack. 



How to know it. — A perceptible rise in cie temperature of the body 

 occurs about two days before any other symptoms present themselves; 

 and it has been shown that the virus exists in the blood at the time a rise 

 in temperature is first noticed. Inoculation with serum of the blood taken 

 from an animal at this time, wiF pr jduce the disease. The temperature 

 in the course of two days rises c> 104° or 105° F., when the following 



