SHEEP HUSBANDRY IN THE SOUTH. 



" If the foot has been in a manner stripped of its horn, and especially if a considerable por- 

 tion of the sole has been removed, it may be expedient to wrap a little clean tow round 

 the foot, and to bind it tightly down with a tape, the sheep being removed to a straw-yard, 

 or some inclosed space, or to a drier pasture ..... The foot should be dressed every day, 

 each new separation of horn removed, and every portion of the fungus submitted to the 

 caustic.'' * 



Mr. Spooner recommends daily, and not less troublesome treatment.! 

 The Mountain Shepherd's Manual recommends daily treatment,! and this 

 is the case, I believe, with nearly all, if not all, of the foreign veterinarians. 

 Professor Pictet, of Switzerland, in addition to daily applications, fumiga- 

 tions, etc., innumerable, goes a step beyond " tow pledgets and tape band- 

 ages." He says : 



" In order to prevent any dirt, &c., from getting into the wound, the diseased foot should 

 be placed in a little boot, the sole of which is of leather or felt, and the upper part of cloth, 

 in order to fasten it round the leg of the sheep." 



This disease rages most when haying and harvesting are at their highl, 

 in the Northern States in July and August and when the labor of day 

 hands costs from seventy-five cents to a dollar per head per diem. Half 

 the flocks in the country can then be bought for $1 25 per head. How 

 soon daily parings, cauterizings, embrocations, fumigations, etc., including 

 the expense of drugs and Professor Pictet's gaiter-boots, would reach an 

 expense equivalent to the price of a sound sheep, it requires not the exer* 

 cise of much arithmetic to determine ! It would certainly be more eco- 

 nomical to kill sheep of any ordinary grade in the first instance ! 



The same remark will apply to the English system of treating nearly 

 all important diseases. The labor bestowed on it would be worth more, 

 here, than the value of the sheep. 



3. The English ovine veterinary pharmacopoeia is too extensive and 

 complex for popular use. The prescribed formulae are so compound in 

 their character so minute oftentimes in their quantitative proportions re- 

 quire so much skill for their chemical and mechanical admixture and, 

 lastly, and more important than all the rest, they demand so much med- 

 ical knowledge for their proper and timely administration that they can 

 be generally used with safety and advantage only by professional veteri- 

 narians, a class entirely wanting, unless occasionally in cities, in the United 

 States. Besides, our ordinary country drug-stores are usually lacking in 

 many of the articles included in the European prescriptions || and no one, 

 without possessing considerable medical knowledge, could decide what 

 effect it would have on the prescription to subtract this or that ingredient. 

 It might neutralize its effects, or even render it pernicious. 



A veterinary system for anything like popular use, in this country, must 

 be exceedingly simple in its remedies, and in its rules for their administra- 

 tion. As it is impossible to describe the various symptoms which may 

 exhibit themselves in a disease, so as to be understood by all, it is unsafe 

 to prescribe a constant change of medicines, applicable to the several 

 states which have caused those symptoms to appear. Indeed, changes in 

 medicine should only be made consequent on those distinct crises of dis- 

 ease which can be detected and understood by the most ordinary observer. 

 Prescriptions, therefore, inapplicable, or at least unsafe, in any stage from 

 one distinct crisis of disease to another, should, as far as practicable, be 

 avoided. True, such a system of therapeutics will be very imperfect, par- 

 ticularly in the treatment of serious constitutional maladies. But it will go 



* Ybuatt, p. 529. f Spooner, (endorsing the views of Mr. Read,) p. 438 to 442. 



I Quern vide, p. 27. 



\j Not unfrequently the most important ones, as I know from repeated experience. 



2F 



