TREATMENT OF REDWATER 185 



Christophers has given an account of some stages in 

 the development of the dog piroplasm in the tick, 

 R. sanguinetis, but there are still some gaps, and few 

 observers have been able to follow all that has been 

 described. In the egg the piroplasms become more 

 or less rounded and penetrate the cells of the 

 developing embryo. In some parts of the body no 

 development seems to occur, but in the salivary 

 glands Christophers states that the parasites break 

 up into swarms of smaller forms, which he terms 

 sporozoites, and these minute bodies are injected 

 with the salivary fluid when a wound is made by 

 the bite of the tick. 



The treatment both of piroplasmosis and of Coast 

 fever at the present time is somewhat unsatisfactory. 

 Nuttall and Hadwen, by injecting a i to i per cent, 

 solution of trypan blue intravenously, cured dogs 

 infected artificially with piroplasmosis in England, 

 and it was hoped that the use of this drug might 

 stop the great mortality among cattle. Up to the 

 present, in Queensland and America, when the drug 

 has been tried for cattle, it has been found of some 

 service, but dogs in India, even though treated with 

 the greatest care, have often died without any im- 

 provement. Recently the writers were in communi- 

 cation with a large stockbreeder of South Africa, 

 and this gentleman informed us that no doubt the 

 trypan blue was of some use, but that the meat was 

 unsaleable even a year and a half after the use of the 

 drug, owing to the staining effect of the trypan blue. 

 The drug appears to be most useful in mild or 

 chronic cases of piroplasmosis. In acute cases, 



