BLACK TONGUE. 419 



BLACK TONGUE. 



About the time the early editions of this work were 

 in press, another epizootic disease broke out. and was 

 making great havoc among the cattle of some of the 

 southern states, especially North and South Carolina, 

 Georgia, and Florida. In the latter state it attacked, 

 also, and destroyed vast numbers of the deer in the for- 

 ests, and was not confined to neat cattle. This malig- 

 nant disease was known as the black tongue, and was 

 ascribed by many to the general existence of rust in the 

 grain and grass crops in those states. The early symp- 

 toms are stiffness, causing the animal to walk as though 

 foundered ; copious frothing at the mouth, inability to 

 take food, and rapid falling off in flesh, while the tongue 

 and gums become very much swollen and turn black. 



This dreadful epizootic, unlike pleuro-pneumonia, runs 

 its course with fearful rapidity ; and any treatment which 

 it is proposed to try must be adopted with promptness, 

 or it is wholly useless. It appears to be congestive in 

 its character, and to assume a typhoid form. As soon as 

 the presence of the disease is suspected, Dr. Dadd rec- 

 ommends giving twelve ounces of table salt in one quart 

 of warm water, adding to it two ounces of tincture of 

 capsicum, to act as a powerful antiseptic and stimulating 

 tonic, and to relieve the venous congestion. 



Sometimes there appears to be an accumulation of gas 

 beneath the skin. If this is observed, give the animal 

 two ounces of pyroligneous acid, twenty-eight drops of 

 pure oil of sassafras, and one quart of linseed tea. Mix 

 the oil with the tea, and then add the acid. Then apply 

 the following, rubbing the external surfaces of the tu- 

 mors with it : Four ounces soft soap, half an ounce oil 

 of sassafras dissolved in two ounces of alcohol, two 

 ounces of tincture of capsicum, and one pint of the tincture 

 of Peruvian bark. Cover the swollen tongue with fine 

 salt ; and as soon as any improvement in the animal's 

 condition appears, an ounce of the fluid extract of cam- 

 omile flowers may be given twice daily as a tonic to re- 

 store the appetite and the general tone of the system. 



