rOOT-KOT IN SHEEP. 395 



FOOT-ROT m SHEEP. 



There are few diseases upon the nature and causes of which 

 so much difference of opinion exists as upon this troublesome 

 and vexatious source of loss. 



Continental, as well as some English and American veterinary- 

 writers and observers, divide foot-rot into two varieties, namely, 

 contagious and non-contagious. 



The first or contagious form is called by a variety of names, 

 as Paronchyia ungularis ovium maligna or contagiosa (Latin) ; 

 Fietin, Pietin contagieux, Mai de pied, &c. (French) ; Bosartige 

 Klaueseuche der Schafe, &c. (German) ; and the latter, Paronchyia 

 inter-digitalis, or gravelling. 



Mr. George Fleming is the latest writer upon the subject, who 

 has re-opened the question of the contagiousness of foot-rot, and 

 in his work on Veterinary Sanitary Science and Police brings 

 forward the opinions of Gohier, Chaumontel, Gasparin, Girard, 

 Eeynal, Eandall (an American writer), and others, in support of 

 its contagiousness ; but he seems to have passed over the deduc- 

 tions of English writers for and against this hyothesis. Hogg, 

 the Ettrick Shepherd, in his prize essay, communicated to the 

 Highland and Agricultural Society of Scotland, was a firm 

 believer in its contagiousness. Youatt seems to be uncertain 

 upon the matter. Professor Brown, in an able essay published 

 in the Journal of the Bath and West of England Society, as well 

 as Professor Dick, unhesitatingly state that it is a non-contagious 

 disease. 



In his lectures Professor Dick said as follows : — " Foot-rot is 

 the name given to a disease in sheep similar to ' Foul in the 

 foot' of horned cattle. Its consequences are disastrous and 

 ruinous, attacking, if neglected, the whole flock, so that in feed- 

 ing they actually crawl on their knees ; hence it is regarded in 

 the last degree contagious. After a good deal of investigation, 

 however, I have arrived at a different conclusion; and I discover in 

 its history nothing more than the result of that domestic state to 

 which the sheep has been subjected. By nature not unlike the 

 goat, it frequents the summits of the lofty mountains, where its 

 hoofs, altogether analogous to those of the horse, are exposed to 

 much tear and wear. When from these alpine regions we 

 transfer the sheep into our grassy lawns, our moorish lands, or 



