SEVENTH ANNUAL REPORT. 107 



was also of the broncho-pneumonic character, one of them being 

 due to aspiration of food. The remaining- cases are well-defined 

 instances of lobar pneumonia. Lobar pneumonia has usually 

 been found to present a terminal stage of some other condition, 

 usually primary. In three cases among the canidse the primary 

 cause was distemper, among the ruminants it has usually been 

 either the direct or remote result of gastro-enteritis. No bacterial 

 investigations have been made of the disease, but I am fully con- 

 vinced from its clinical aspects and from the pathological find- 

 ings that the disease, as in the human, is by no means a specific 

 one, always caused by the pneumococcus, but that many infective 

 agents may alike produce it. the chief factors being those of pre- 

 disposition. Probably as chief among these predisposing factors 

 are to be considered those conditions or diseases tending to a 

 general lowering of the resistance of the body forces, in other 

 words we may well liken the usual case of the disease (lobar 

 pneumonia) to the pneumonia of senile men. I propose to dis- 

 cuss later more fully the conditions which I believe specially 

 predispose to this disease. 



PARASITIC DISEASES. 



In our last report we mentioned the prevalence of cysterci in 

 the cadavers of the animals dying in the Park — they were found 

 present in nearly all cases, involving alike reptilia, mammals, and 

 even the amphibia, and being found in every viscus. During 

 the past year they have been found with equal frequency, and 

 in three cases have apparently caused death of the invaded ani- 

 mals. The condition therefore becomes of importance. Doubt- 

 less in many more cases it is at least a causative agent in the pro- 

 duction of anaemia and malnutrition. Dr. Blair has made a 

 special study of the condition as found in our animals and as 

 described in the available literature, and his report will be found 

 appended. 



I have already mentioned the bronchial filaria and the fact that 

 it has caused death through broncho-pneumonia; in last year's 

 report I mentioned this fact as a possibility. 



INTESTINAL PARASITES. 



Are found very abundantly, and in very many cases they have 

 been the cause of impaired food absorption and malnutrition, and 

 have hence predisposed to gastro-enteritis. In two of the canidas 

 fatal enteritis was thus excited, and in three covotes death was 



