DISEASES OF SHEEP. 



who is accustomed to look on and let things take their course. It is, 

 however, good advice, and he will find it so, if he will but follow it. 

 Yet let hiai not, in his determination to rouse himself and do some- 

 thing, listen too much to the suggestions of the shepherd or the far- 

 rier. Let him not give any of those abominable cordial drinks, which 

 have destroyed thousands of sheep. Warmth, housing at night, 

 littering with clean straw, and warm gruel if the animal will not eat 

 or drink, are not only allowable, but useful : nay, I would allow a 

 Utile ginger or a little ale with the medicine ; but not those compounds 

 of all manner of hot and injurious spices, which would kindle a fire 

 in the veins of the animal, if it were not blazing there before. 



[Experienced sheep^breeders recommend a dose of tar, to be repeated for foul noses ; 

 IWJt lest that be neglected, it is recommended as a good precaution, under all circum* 

 stances, to have some saplings or small trees bored with a large auger at proper dis. 

 tances, and the holes to be kept supplied with common salt. Let the edges of these 

 holes be smeared with tar, and thus the sheep in the act of getting the salt will tar 

 his own nose. There can be no doubt that this would be a good and wholesome 

 practice as an item of general management. Few farmers attend as they ought to 

 do, to having their stock regularly and plentifully salted, and there is known to be 

 something in tar and in resinous plants, as pine and cedar, particularly healthy for 

 sheep. — S.] 



INFLAMMATION OF THE LUNGS 



Is not unfrequently the result of a common cold, not attended to, 

 the disease extending itself to the lungs ; it more commonly appears 

 in the spring of the year; its symptoms are dulness, hanging of the 

 ears, quick breathing, cough, and discharge from the nostrils. The 

 animal should be bled freely from the neck — a pint in general will 

 not be too much for a full-grown animal to lose. After tiiis a dose of 

 salts should be given, and should be followed by the Fever Drink 

 (No. 4, p. 201) once a day. 



INFLUENZA. 



Sometimes a catarrh assumes an epidemic form, and appears as the 

 influenza. This disease may be distinguished from a cold, or from 

 bronchitis, by the discharge from the nostrils being more profuse and 

 the eyes nearly closed, great uneasiness of the head, and a sudden 

 prostration of strength. Sometimes the animal will run round in a 

 circle, and a rattling will be heard in the windpipe : tliese symptoms 

 will be soon followed by death. 



Bleeding should in general be abstained from in this disease, but 

 half an ounce of Epsom salts, with one drachm of gentian, should 

 be given dissolved in gruel ; but if the sheep purged before, instead 

 of the above the following should be given, and be assisted by good 

 nursing and care : — 



RECIPE (No. 7). 

 Take prepared chalk, one ounce ; catechu, half a drac?ui) ; opium, twenty grains ; 

 spirit of nitrons ether, two drachms ; geiilian, one drachm. To be dissolved in gruel, 

 and given twice a day till the purging ceases; after which the two last ingredients, 

 with a drachm of nitre and ten grains of tartarised antimony, should be given in 

 gruel once a day. 



